Dr Sue Outram

Biography

Dr Sue Outram is currently the Head of the Discipline of Health Behaviour Sciences in the School of Medicine and Public Health, Faculty of Health and Medicine. She is responsible for managing a large cross disciplinary undergraduate and postgraduate teaching program, 6-8 academic staff, casual lecturing staff and 20 conjoint staff and RHD students (up to 20). Dr Outram's academic contribution has previously been demonstrated in leadership in teaching and administration, and is in the early stages of her research career. Her research outputs should be reviewed relative to opportunity. She has worked part time for most of her university tenure (while bearing and raising 3 children) only returning to work full time in 2003. Having gained her PhD in 2002, she is an early career researcher. Despite this late entry to research, Dr Outram has demonstrated her capacity to initiate a large research project, manage and follow it through to publication via her doctoral research. Since completion of her PhD, Dr Outram has collaborated on a number of research projects within the health behaviour discipline (reduction of alcohol related harm), across disciplines (Indigenous, psychiatry, medical education) and across universities (Sydney and Queensland -Vietnam veterans and partners) in the mental health and behavioural science fields. She has published five papers in peer reviewed journals and published a monograph since 2000 (4 since 2004), presented at many conferences and has papers in refereed conference proceedings before 2000. She is PI (1 & 2) on 4 separate competitive grants 2004-2006 for health and wellbeing of partners of Vietnam Veterans totalling $116,000; AI on the $567,000 Vietnam veterans grant, from which peer reviewed papers are now being prepared (2 conference papers from the study delivered last November); an investigator on a successful 2011 NHMRC grant for an epidemiological study of the health children of Vietnam veterans. This will be the only methodologically rigorous study of a longitudinal family cohort of impact of Vietnam war on Australian service personnel.  A large cross institutional project aimed at enhancing the clinical communication skills of mental health clinicians in regards to serious mental illness is currenlty underway with researchers of Universities of Newcastle and Monash and collaborators in the USA, UK and Qatar. Dr Outram has been a named investigator on 8 different Teaching and Learning grants over the past 4 years, (led 4) on diverse topics including peer observation of teaching, experiences of low SES medical students, increasing capacity of academic staff to teach about social disadvantage and inequity. Dr Outram has been awarded Faculty of Health, UoN Vice-Chancellor’s award and citation and 2 national awards.

Research Interest

Mental Health, Public Health and Health Services