Use Of Innovative Mobile Telehealth Technology To Enable A New Service Delivery Solution For Dysphagia Management
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$207,231.00
Summary
Dysphagia, the term used to describe a swallowing difficulty, affects up to 30% of people over 65 years of age. Speech pathologists are responsible for diagnosing and managing dysphagia, however there is a shortfall between the number of clinicians available and the large number of individuals with this condition. The study aims to validate a way to assess dysphagia using telehealth, to increase access to speech pathology services particularly for patients in rural health settings.
Improved Support For Regional And Remote Paediatric Oncology Families: A Randomised Controlled Trial Of Videotelephony
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$304,843.00
Summary
Childhood cancer presents a major life stressor for the entire family. Significant changes to the everyday lives of families, practically, socially and emotionally cause major disruption. There is evidence that this disruption results in isolation and poor communication between family members, anxiety, low self-esteem and school problems for siblings and anxiety, post-traumatic stress symptoms and risk of depression for parents. Providing ongoing support to these families is an essential part of ....Childhood cancer presents a major life stressor for the entire family. Significant changes to the everyday lives of families, practically, socially and emotionally cause major disruption. There is evidence that this disruption results in isolation and poor communication between family members, anxiety, low self-esteem and school problems for siblings and anxiety, post-traumatic stress symptoms and risk of depression for parents. Providing ongoing support to these families is an essential part of care. The Royal Children's Hospital (RCH) Paediatric Oncology Service in Brisbane is the major tertiary paediatric referral centre for Queensland, northern New South Wales and the southwest Pacific. A multidisciplinary team of medical, nursing, and allied health professionals provides care and support to children with cancer, as well as their families. Each year around 100 newly diagnosed patients are cared for. Around 60% of the families cared for by the service live in regional and remote areas. There are a number of challenges which inhibit the equitable provision of specialist health services to these areas including availability of health care professionals and accessibility due to distance, time, cost and transport. For paediatric oncology families, opportunities to receive support are limited. One possible solution is the use of online support mechanisms, such as videotelephony, to facilitate the provision of much needed support to patients, parents, siblings and the family as a whole. The objective of this research is to see if videotelephony can be used to support regional and remote families of the Royal Children's Hospital Paediatric Oncology Service providing indizidualised communication, education, counselling and monitoring. This will present a new and innovative use of videophone technology as well as a new method for supporting regional and remote oncology patients and their families.Read moreRead less
Telerehabilitation: Assessing Acquired Neurogenic Communication Disorders Online.
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$172,446.00
Summary
People who suffer brain damage as a result of a stroke, head injury, or a disorder such as Parkinson's disease frequently develop difficulty in either speaking, writing, reading, or understanding the spoken language. As a result, the person's ability to communicate with his or her family and friends, and the community in general is seriously affected. Individuals who experience these speech and language disorders are treated by a speech pathologist who focuses on improving the person's ability t ....People who suffer brain damage as a result of a stroke, head injury, or a disorder such as Parkinson's disease frequently develop difficulty in either speaking, writing, reading, or understanding the spoken language. As a result, the person's ability to communicate with his or her family and friends, and the community in general is seriously affected. Individuals who experience these speech and language disorders are treated by a speech pathologist who focuses on improving the person's ability to communicate. The treatment of these disorders is frequently long-term requiring speech pathology management beyond existing hospital care. For many people with these communication disorders, accessing speech pathology services after their discharge from hospital may be very difficult due to their physical difficulties, the distances they are required to travel, and the limited availability of speech pathologists in their local community. This project aims to overcome these access issues through the development of a telerehabilitation system that will enable speech pathologists to assess people with these speech and language difficulties across the Internet using videoconferencing. It is intended that this research will ultimately enable people with these types of communication difficulties to be assessed and treated within their own home or local community.Read moreRead less
Hedgehog Signalling In Limb And Craniofacial Development And Disease
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$494,544.00
Summary
Anomalies of the face and limbs are amongst the most common features of human birth defects, and their frequent association suggests that the same genes are involved in governing the development of the limbs and face during embryogenesis. We have used a genomics-based approach to identify genes involved in limb development based on their alteration in a mouse model which develops extra fingers and toes. Defects in this mouse result from changes in Gli3, a gene which is known to be important in b ....Anomalies of the face and limbs are amongst the most common features of human birth defects, and their frequent association suggests that the same genes are involved in governing the development of the limbs and face during embryogenesis. We have used a genomics-based approach to identify genes involved in limb development based on their alteration in a mouse model which develops extra fingers and toes. Defects in this mouse result from changes in Gli3, a gene which is known to be important in both limb and face development. Based on the organs in which our genes of interest are active, we believe that they will also play key roles in embryonic development of the limbs, face and other organs. We now plan to investigate the regulation of a subset of these genes based on analysis in mouse models of limb and face development. In addition, we have chosen to further analyse the function of a completely novel gene we have identified which our preliminary studies suggest may play a role in the normal development of the lip and palate. These studies have the potential to shed light on the processes governing how organs develop, as well as on the molecular basis of common birth defects such as polydactyly (extra fingers and toes) and cleft palate.Read moreRead less