The Annual Immunisation Forum is a one day event that gives healthcare professionals a greater understanding of immunisation and vaccine preventable diseases
The 8th Annual Immunisation Forum (AIF) hybrid event took place at the Stamford Plaza Hotel in Brisbane on June 14, 2024, immediately following the PHAA’s Communicable Diseases & Immunisation Conference (CDIC).
The meeting is ideal for GPs, practice nurses, specialists, pharmacists and other immunisation specialists. The program covers the following topics: a look into aged care, new vaccines for the elderly, adjuvanted vaccines, vaccinations in primary care and pharmacy, managing vaccine hesitancy, targeting at-risk populations and addressing the vaccine gap of first nations peoples.
Accreditation ID: 889803 The 8th Annual Immunisation Forum 2024 is RACGP accredited for 6 CPD hours for online attendees.
Session 1 - Advances in vaccine technology
Speaker: Prof Robert Booy
Robert Booy is honorary Professor of Paediatrics and Child Health at the University of Sydney. From 2005 to 2019 he held Senior roles at NCIRS. He is a medical graduate of the University of Queensland (1984), trained in paediatrics at the Royal Children’s Hospital in Brisbane and has held a range of positions in the UK. Professor Booy’s research interests extend from understanding the genetic basis of susceptibility to, and severity of, infectious diseases, especially influenza, RSV and invasive disease caused by encapsulated organisms; the clinical, public health and social burden of these diseases; and means by which to prevent or control serious infections through vaccines, drugs and non-pharmaceutical measures. Over the past 20 years, Professor Booy has been increasingly recognised as an expert in the respiratory virus field, supervising many studies addressing the burden and prevention of influenza disease in children and adults in the UK, Australia and among Muslim pilgrims to Saudi Arabia. In addition he has led intervention studies with new vaccines, new vaccine delivery methods and alternate methods for preventing disease and transmission such as antivirals and personal protective equipment. Professor Robert Booy is a Director at the Immunisation Coalition.
Prof Paul Van Buynder is a Public Health Physician and past Chairman of the Immunisation Coalition. He is a professor in the School of Medicine at Griffith University in Queensland. He has held senior public health positions in a number of Australian states, in two Canadian jurisdictions and at the Centre for Infections in the UK. He has held personal appointments on sub-committees of National Immunisation Technical Advisory Committees in three continents. Paul is a reviewer of over 10 journals and has over 80 referred book chapters and articles.
Dr Cristyn Davies is a Research Fellow in the Specialty of Child and Adolescent Health, Faculty of Medicine and Health, University of Sydney Children’s Hospital Westmead Clinical School, NSW Australia. She is also an adjunct at the School of Social Sciences, Western Sydney University. Dr Davies is President of the Australian Association for Adolescent Health, co-convenor of the Child and Youth Health Special Interest Group of the Public Health Association of Australia, and a member of the University of Sydney’s Infectious Diseases Institute. Her current vaccination-related research program includes 1) Adolescent knowledge about HPV vaccination; psychosocial outcomes, and vaccination uptake in school-based and clinic vaccination programs; 2) Vaccination delivery systems (standard and High-Density Microarray Patch technology); 3) Health education and vaccination literacy; 4) Sexual Health and Relationships education both at school and in clinical/other environments for children and young people, and 5) Implementation Science and Knowledge Translation. Dr Davies enjoys working with key stakeholders to improve vaccination acceptance. She is committed to using evidence-based research to close the gap between research and its translation into policy and practice.
Matthew Berger is a PhD candidate and a research officer at the University of Sydney. He is also a public health nurse in the communicable disease team at the Centre for Population Health, Western Sydney Local Health District. Matthew’s PhD investigates the safety, usability, and acceptability of microarray patches for vaccination. He is also recognised as a credentialed infection control professional by the Australasian College for Infection Prevention and Control and a member of the Public Health Association of Australia and the Canadian Public Health Association. Matthew completed his Master of Science in Medicine (Infection and Immunity) and Master of Philosophy (Medicine) at the University of Sydney and a Master of Public Health in Epidemiology at UNSW.
An Infectious Diseases Physician and Clinical Microbiologist, Professor Paul Griffin was appointed as the Director of Infectious Diseases at Mater Health Services in 2013, and most recently, to his conjoint role as Head of the Mater Clinical Unit for the University of Queensland School of Medicine. Paul is an accomplished clinical trial investigator, having fulfilled the role of Principal Investigator in over 150 clinical trials, particularly in Infectious Diseases including 8 COVID-19 vaccines. Despite an already demanding role at the Mater, Paul continues as a member of the AMA Queensland Council 2023-2024, and as board member and scientific advisory board member of the Immunisation Coalition, with active interest in vaccine education and advocacy, becoming a trusted media authority and spokesperson across the nation during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Speaker: Advances in vaccine technology
Session 2 - Strategies and tactics to increase vaccination rates (part 1)
Dr Anita Sharma is the practice principal of Platinum Medical Centre, a medical educator and an accredited supervisor for general practice registrars and medical students. She is co-author of RACGP Handbook of T2 D management in Primary care and contributes towards writing CHECK programs for RACGP. She is a member of The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners’ Education Committee and the Diabetes National Faculty Specific Interest Group. She is a senior lecturer at the University of Queensland’s School of Clinical Medicine Primary Care Clinical Unit and serves on the editorial board for Medicine Today.
Dr Sharma serves on the advisory board for Reed Medical Education and develops education modules on chronic diseases like diabetes, heart failure, Chronic Kidney Disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, obesity and osteoporosis. Dr Sharma is a medical review officer and designated aviation medical examiner for the Civil Aviation Safety Authority and Medical Review Officer for Civil Aviation Society of Australia. She is a member of MDA National’s State Advisory Committee (Queensland) and active member of Queensland Medical Women’s Society (QMWS), Australian Federation of Medical Women( AFMW) and Doctor’s Health Queensland ( DHQ). Maintaining high clinical standards, contributing to articles and clinical guidelines and teaching are her passions.
Karen Castle is a policy pharmacist at the Pharmaceutical Society of Australia and a pharmacist immuniser at a community pharmacy in Brisbane.
Karen has over 20 years experience as a pharmacist having worked in community and hospital pharmacy and in government and holds postgraduate qualifications in public health and policy analysis.
Dr Sarah Chu graduated from the University of Queensland in 2004 with a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery. She is a member of the International Society of Travel Medicine and has a Certificate in Travel Health; she enjoyed providing travel medicine services at The Travel Doctor TMVC Brisbane before COVID-19 and is an accredited Yellow Fever doctor. In addition to being awarded a Fellowship from the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners, she is a Fellow of The Australasian College of Tropical Medicine, Fellow of The Australasian College of Tropical Medicine (Faculty of Travel Medicine), Associate Member of the Faculty of Travel Medicine Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow; Dr Chu also holds a Diploma in Dermatology from the Australian Institute of Dermatology, and a Diploma in Child Health from Westmead Children’s Hospital and the University of Sydney. She enjoys practising yoga and is a registered level 1 yoga teacher with Yoga Australia. Dr Chu recently completed Physician Board Certification in Lifestyle Medicine with the International Board of Lifestyle Medicine. She is a Senior Lecturer for the University of Queensland and enjoys teaching the next generation of doctors-in-training.
As the Divisional Medical Director of Continued Care and Director of Geriatric Medicine at Austin Health, Associate Professor Michael Murray AM brings extensive experience in the health, education and the aged care industry.
With nearly 30 years involvement in geriatric care, Michael’s career highlights include extensive work in continence, public health and public policy, as well as working in education and service development. Michael holds several University, board and committee positions with a variety of health and educational institutions Michael was the National Chairperson of the Continence Foundation of Australia for several years, prior to which he was the Victorian State President. Michael is the current president of the National Ageing Research Institute. Michael sits on several aged care facility boards and he was the Geriatrician Lead to the Victorian Aged Care Response Centre (VACRC) for Covid-19.” Michael was the first interim Chief Clinical Advisor to the first Aged Care Quality and Safety Commissioner and is a current member of the National Advisory committee Aged Care (NACAC) and the Aged Care Group to AHPPC.
Kristy Crooks is a Euahlayi woman. She is the Aboriginal Program Manager and leads the Public Health Aboriginal Team, Health Protection- Hunter New England Population Health. She is also an APPRISE PhD scholar to develop a process of how to privilege First Nations voices in infectious disease emergency planning and response. She has extensive expertise in Aboriginal health, public health and cultural governance change within an organisation. Kristy co-leads several research projects with some focusing on improving vaccination coverage for First Nations peoples.
Speaker: Strategies and tactics to increase vaccination rates (part 1)
Session 3 - Strategies and tactics to increase vaccination rates (part 2)
Dr Jessica Kaufman is a Senior Research Fellow in the Vaccine Uptake Group at the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute. She is an expert in vaccine communication and the social and behavioural science of vaccination. Some of her current projects include evaluating the impacts of vaccine mandates in Australia, developing an Arabic-language online game to reduce vaccine misinformation, and training community leaders to be vaccine advocates in the Asia Pacific region. Jessica is an NHMRC Emerging Leader Fellow and an E. H. Flack Foundation Fellow. She is the Deputy Chair of the Collaboration on Social Science and Immunisation (COSSI).
Hazel is Lead Epidemiologist, Child Health Informatics and Surveillance Manager, Vaccine Signal Detection & Investigation at SAEFVIC, Victoria’s Vaccine Safety Service. Her doctoral work on optimizing spontaneous vaccine safety surveillance has had immediate relevance and continued impact since the global Coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 crisis brought calls for development and release of vaccines at “pandemic speed”, further highlighting the need for robust and timely vaccine safety surveillance.
She continues to lead in this field of research with expertise in vaccinology, surveillance and signal detection. Hazel is also experienced in public health and infectious diseases more broadly with a strong background in emerging infectious diseases, outbreak management and infectious disease surveillance system design and evaluation.
Kasia Bolsewicz, PhD, MPH, is a social science research fellow at the National Centre for Immunisation Research and Surveillance (NCIRS), where she conducts local and national studies with various immunisation stakeholders (including healthcare providers, communities, immunisation coordinators and policymakers) to understand reasons behind vaccination acceptance and uptake and to propose relevant strategies to address the underlying barriers. She also coordinates group processes during which immunisation stakeholders share information and workshop solutions, and designs and conducts program evaluations. Before joining NCIRS in 2019, Kasia was working with four local health districts in NSW using the World Health Organization’s Tailoring Immunization Programmes to identify areas of low childhood vaccine coverage and to gain a greater understanding of factors that influence childhood immunisation.
Speaker: Strategies and tactics to increase vaccination rates (part 2)
Session 4 - Vaccination in pregnancy and tools to help drive vaccination
Professor Peter Richmond is a Consultant Paediatric Immunologist and Paediatrician at Perth Children’s Hospital, and is Head of the Immunology Department at the Child and Adolescent Health Service in WA. He also heads the Vaccine Trials Group within the Wesfarmers Centre of Vaccines and Infectious Diseases at the Telethon Kids Institute, and is Head of the Discipline of Paediatrics at the UWA Medical School. His major research interests are in the prevention of meningitis, pneumonia, respiratory infections and otitis media. He has authored over 300 scientific publications in these areas and has worked in vaccine research for over 25 years.
Dr Lisa Beecham spent 5 years working at Royal Children’s Hospital as a Registrar and witnessed the devastating effects of infections that vaccines can protect against. This has led to a lifelong interest in promoting, communicating and using systems to ensure immunisations are given to all who need them. She is Chair of GCPHN ( Gold Coast Primary Health network who first developed the data tool Primary Sense) and the National Clinical Advisory group for Primary Sense ( Data and population tool) and the RACGP representative on the Qld Immunisation Partnership group.
Jennifer Herz is the co-founder of Biointelect, providing strategic commercialisation services to the biopharmaceutical industry. Biointelect has supported end to end commercialisation of vaccines. She has over twenty years commercialisation experience in the biopharmaceutical industry and has held executive roles with responsibility for Australia, New Zealand and European and International markets. She previously served on the Board of Medicines Australia and was the founding chair of their Vaccine Industry Group.
Jennifer is a member of the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) – Health Research Impact Committee (HRIC) for the 2021-2024 triennium. The NSW Innovation & Productivity Council and the AAMRNet Steering Committee. Jennifer has overseen many vaccine launches as well as advised on commercial strategy for multiple early stage vaccine candidates. She serves on several biotech Boards of Australian subsidiary companies and has significant experience in corporate governance and strategy.
The inaugural Australian Vaccine Value Chain Conference (AVVCC) was held in May 2024 and Jennifer was the Chair of the Program Committee.
Speaker: Vaccination in pregnancy and tools to help drive vaccination