Fellowship recipient to investigate international best practice in research translation

A research affiliate working on strategies for preventing mental ill-health has been awarded the 2019-20 Prevention Hub Fellowship.

The Fellowship provides an opportunity for researchers to travel overseas to investigate international best practice in mental health research focused on translating preventive strategies for anxiety and depression.

Dr Simon Baker, Research Program Manager at the Black Dog Institute, was awarded an $8,000 Fellowship to investigate international best practice in the translation and implementation of prevention and early intervention strategies for depression. He will share and apply the resulting new knowledge in Australia.

In addition, two Everymind Mental Health and Research team members, Project Officer Elloyse Saw and Senior Project Officer Dr Zoi Triandafilidis, have each received a conference travel award of $2,000 to assist them in presenting The Prevention Hub’s work at forthcoming research meetings in 2019 and 2020.

With the Fellowship funding, Dr Baker plans to visit several organisations across Europe to collaborate and exchange ideas with world-leading professionals and academics around the development, translation and implementation of prevention and early intervention strategies.

“Despite extensive research and development, few prevention and treatment strategies for depression make it out of ‘the lab,’ and fewer still make it into ‘the real world’,” Dr Baker said.

“It is a major challenge to successfully translate and implement these strategies nationally and internationally.

“I am pleased that this Fellowship will enable me to learn from international best practice strategies so we can embed these into prevention and early intervention strategies in Australia.”

Ms Saw, a PhD candidate at the University of Newcastle, seeks to explore accessible interventions for family and friend carers of people with anxiety or depression.
Her study will evaluate Minds Together, The Prevention Hub’s new online support program for mental health carers, to determine if a digital intervention can overcome limitations of face-to-face programs, which include geography, stigma, time and flexibility.

Minds Together for family and friend carers will be officially launched in 2020.                                             

Dr Triandafilidis will use analysis of conversations and language to better understand how caring is understood by families and carers of adults experiencing anxiety or depressive symptoms.
She will analyse qualitative interview data from mental health carers to inform content included within the Minds Together online program.

All three funding recipients will share and disseminate their findings and new knowledge through publications and presentations at conferences and meetings.

Learn more about the Minds Together suite of tailored programs and resources to support mental health on the Everymind website.