We bring together a diverse group of world leading researchers, strengthening our ability to achieve transformative research, while delivering new opportunities and greater assistance to our teams.
Our research strategy will focus on areas of strength, drawing upon the expertise and resources of the University of Sydney, Sydney Local Health District and the Northern Sydney Local Health District.
Our Research Portfolios bring together the tremendous expertise across the flagships’ well-respected research teams. Collectively, they will undertake collaborative research addressing the needs of society and will strive to discover new ways to prevent, manage and cure disabling musculoskeletal conditions, to improve health outcomes for all.
We undertake basic/discovery, translational, and clinical research into all forms of arthritis driven by the immune system, ageing, injury, biomechanics, and metabolic disease, including:
Our vision is to define disease mechanisms and pave the way for new and better treatment options, slower disease progression, decreased symptoms and lifestyle impacts, and ideally, potential cures, for these chronic, painful, disabling conditions.
Our focus is on understanding the mechanisms and outcomes of back and neck pain, developing and testing interventions, and working with partners to improve clinical care and patient outcomes.
We're made up of consumers, clinicians, junior and senior researchers, research students and professional staff from a variety of backgrounds including physiotherapy, chiropractic, pharmacy, rheumatology, emergency medicine and orthopaedic surgery
We welcome new members regardless of research experience and academic seniority.
This trial will evaluate the effect of an opioid stewardship intervention on general practitioner prescribing of opioid medicines dispensed to their patients with low back pain over 1 year from index visit.
Lead investigator: Dr Christina Abdel Shaheed
Investigator team: Professor Chris Maher, Professor Fiona Blyth, Professor Andrew McLachlan, Associate Professor Patrick Kelly, Associate Professor Fiona Stanaway, Dr Thomas Lung, Dr Rachel Thompson, Professor Louisa Degenhardt, Associate Professor Rowena Ivers
Operational team: Mr Daniel Chapman, Miss Lisa Vizza
This trial will evaluate the effect of introducing a coordinated support system (linking hospital outpatient physiotherapy services to a public health coaching service) at discharge from low back pain treatment, compared with usual care provided at discharge.
Lead investigator: Professor Paulo Ferreira
Investigator team: Emeritus Professor Adrian Bauman, Professor Melissa Baysari, Professor Manuela Ferreira, Professor Chris Maher, Professor Rachael Morton, Associate Professor Milena Simic, Dr Anita Amorim, Dr Emma Ho, Professor Paul Hodges, Professor Chris Lonsdale, Dr Dragana Ceprnja, Dr Ornella Clavisi, Dr Alice Kongsted, Dr Qiang Li, Dr Kate Reid, Mr Mark Halliday, Mr Matthew Jennings, Ms Katherine Maka, Ms Tahlia Reynolds
Operational team: Dr Carlos Mesa Castrillon, Dr Emma Ho, Mr Julian Comis, Ms Kate Roberts, Mr James Zouch
HELP will investigate whether a media-led intervention presenting evidence-based back pain management information in General Practice waiting rooms is effective at changing patient beliefs and medical practitioner behaviours (prescriptions and referrals).
Lead investigator: Professor Manuela Ferreira
Investigator team: Emeritus Professor Adrian Bauman, Professor Melissa Baysari, Professor Paulo Ferreira, Dr Liliana Laranjo, Dr Gustavo Machado, Professor Andrew Georgiou
Operational team: Ms Carolina G. Fritsch, Mr Michael Knox, Ms Alessandra Marcelo, Mr Riyaas Mohammed, Ms Joanna Prior
NUDG-ED is a 2x2 factorial, open label, before-after, cluster randomised controlled trial that will investigate behavioural ‘nudging’ strategies to reduce use of low value care for low back pain in ED.
Lead investigator: Dr Adrian Traeger
Investigator team: Professor Kirsten Howard, Professor Chris Maher, Professor Kirsten McCaffery, Professor Rachelle Buchbinder, Professor Louise Cullen, Professor Ian Harris, Professor Jeff Linder, Professor Enrico Coiera, Mr Qiang Li
Operational team: Dr Swee Sharma, Ms Gemma Altinger
The Oral Steroids In Sciatica (OASIS) trial is a randomised, placebo-controlled, double-blind trial that will evaluate a tapering regimen of oral prednisolone in 200 participants with acute sciatica.
Lead investigator: Professor Chris Lin
Investigator team: Professor Chris Maher, Professor Andrew McLachlan, Dr Giovanni Ferreira, Dr Christina Abdel Shaheed, Professor Rachelle Buchbinder, Professor Ric Day, Professor Jane Latimer, Dr Qiang Li, Dr Chang Liu, Dr Bethan Richards
Operational team: Ms Melanie Hamilton, Mrs Hanan McLachlan, Ms Melissa Webb
OPAL is a randomised, placebo-controlled, triple-blinded trial that investigates the judicious use of an opioid analgesic in 346 participants with acute low back pain and/or neck pain.
Lead investigator: Professor Chris Lin
Investigator team: Professor Chris Maher, Professor Andrew McLachlan, Professor Laurent Billot, Professor Ric Day, Professor Bart Koes, Professor Jane Latimer, Dr Caitlin Jones
Operational team: Ms Melanie Hamilton, Mrs Hanan McLachlan, Ms Melissa Webb
SUcceSS is a prospectively registered, randomised placebo-controlled trial of decompressive spinal surgery in people with symptomatic lumbar spinal stenosis.
Lead investigator: Professor Manuela Ferreira
Investigator team: Professor Jane Latimer, Professor Chris Maher, Professor David Beard, Professor Rachelle Buchbinder, Professor Ian Harris, Professor Stephen Jan, Dr Gavin Davis, Dr Qian Li, Dr Ralph Mobbs, Dr Ralph Stanford
Operational team: Dr Emma Ho, Mr Michael Knox, Ms Joanna Prior
RESHAPED will develop, implement, and evaluate a novel model of care for the management of low back pain in emergency departments (ED). The model of care aims to relieve pressure on EDs.
Lead investigator: Professor Chris Maher
Investigator team: Professor Lisa Harvey, Professor Kirsten Howard, Professor Kirsten McCaffery, Professor Vasi Naganathan, Associate Professor Chris Williams, Dr Gustavo Machado, Professor Laurent Billot, Professor Rachelle Buchbinder, Professor Ian Harris, Professor Leigh Kinsman, Professor Jonathan Wiggers, Dr James Edwards, Dr Narcyz Ghinea, Dr Eileen Rogan
Operational team: Dr Danielle Coombs
TEXT4myBACK is a randomised clinical trial assessing the efficacy and cost effectiveness of a semi-personalised text message intervention for people with acute low back pain.
Lead investigator: Professor Manuela Ferreira
Investigator team: Professor Clara Chow, Professor Paulo Ferreira, Professor Andrew McLachlan, Professor Julie Redfern, Ms Carolina G. Fritsch, Ms Joanna Prior
Operational team: Ms Carolina G. Fritsch, Ms Alessandra Marcelo, Ms Joanna Prior
This trial will evaluate the effectiveness and feasibility of implementing ‘Back@Home’, a virtual hospital model of care for patients with musculoskeletal low back pain presenting to the emergency department, in reducing length of hospital stay.
Lead investigator: Dr Gustavo Machado
Investigator team: Professor Chris Maher, Dr Danielle M Coombs, Dr Thomas Lung, Ms Alla Melman, Mr Min Jiat Teng, Professor Laurent Billot, Dr Owen Hutchings, Dr Qiang Li, Dr Mona Marabani, Dr Eileen Rogan
Empower is a randomised controlled trial of an eHealth-supported intervention comprised of a physical activity plan and progressive resistance exercise program for people living in rural Australia with chronic non-specific low back pain and/or knee osteoarthritis compared to usual care.
Lead investigator: Professor Paulo Ferreira
Investigator team: Emeritus Professor Adrian Bauman, Professor Manuela Ferreira, Associate Professor Georgina Luscombe, Associate Professor Milena Simic, Dr Carlos Mesa Castrillon, Mr Phillip R Davis, Mr Antonio Michell de Gregorio, Professor Kim Bennell, Dr Grahame Knox, Dr Ornella Clavisi, Dr Stephen Bunker, Ms Kristy Hatswell
Operational team: Dr Carlos Mesa Castrillon, Mr Antonio Michell de Gregorio
Several theme members hold externally funded fellowships:
They are all happy to help other members prepare a competitive application.
The musculoskeletal system is critical to healthy ageing, physical activity and the rehabilitation of people following injury and disease.
We focus on the prognosis, treatment and prevention of musculoskeletal problems that impede healthy ageing, physical activity and rehabilitation.
We conduct qualitative and quantitative research with an emphasis on translating research findings into practice and public health initiatives.
We hope the findings of this project lead to the development of home-based exercise programs to improve strength, balance and reduce falls and improve shoulder functioning in older people.
The aim of this project is to compare the effectiveness of two home-based exercise programs – one aimed at improving lower limb strength and balance for preventing falls and the other aimed at improving upper limb strength and mobility to reduce shoulder dysfunction.
Participants are taught the exercises in a group workshop setting and then complete their exercises at home three times each week for 12 months.
Participants are provided with a calendar to record their exercises and falls each month, and a program manual and exercise weights.
This project is no longer recruiting.
Lead investigator: Professor Cathie Sherrington
Investigator team: Professor Anne Tiedemann, Professor Kirsten Howard, Professor Emeritus Adrian Bauman, Associate Professor Karen Ginn, Dr Paul Van Den Dolder, Dr Susan Furber
For more information about this project, please contact Professor Cathie Sherrington.
This project has received ethics approval from the University of Wollongong and Illawarra Shoalhaven Local Health District.
This is a NHMRC Partnership Grant (2014–2019).
We hope the findings of this project lead to increased physical activity, decreased risk of falling and improved eating habits in older people.
The aim is to evaluate the effectiveness of two 12 month healthy ageing strategies among people who attend established, community-based groups.
The first intervention is a physical activity and fall prevention intervention, including telephone-based health coaching and written information on physical activity and falls.
The second is a nutrition intervention involving telephone-based health coaching and written information about eating habits.
The trial also aims to establish the impact of these interventions on physical activity, eating habits, weight (body mass index), goal attainment, mobility confidence, quality of life, fear of falling, risk-taking behaviour, well-being, and mood.
This project is no longer recruiting.
Lead investigator: Professor Cathie Sherrington
Investigator team: Professor Anne Tiedemann, Professor Kirsten Howard, Professor Dafna Merom, Professor Chris Rissel, Professor Stuart Smith, Associate Professor Allison Tong
For more information about this project, please contact Professor Anne Tiedemann.
This project has received ethics approval from the University of Sydney Human Research Ethics Committee.
This is a NHMRC Project Grant (2015–2018).
We hope the findings of this project lead to the development of a yoga-based exercise program to prevent falls in people aged 65 and over.
The aim of this project is to assess the effectiveness of a 40 week yoga program, compared with an advice booklet, on falls.
We will also assess the effectiveness of the program on other key indicators of healthy ageing, such as mental health, establish the cost-effectiveness of the intervention, and measure the yoga program’s potential for implementation.
Participants allocated to the yoga-based exercise group will attend 40 weeks of twice-weekly, one-hour yoga classes in established yoga studios in Sydney with experienced yoga teachers.
Participants will be asked to complete a home-based yoga program for at least two extra 20-minute sessions each week.
For more information about this project, please contact us at: sph.sagetrial@sydney.edu.au
Lead investigator: Professor Anne Tiedemann
Investigator team: Professor Cathie Sherrington, Professor Stephen Lord, Professor Kirsten Howard, Professor Emeritus Adrian Bauman, Professor Chris Rissel, Emeritus Professor Robert Cumming, Professor Roberta Shepherd, Associate Professor Patrick Kelly, Professor Kaarin Anstey, Dr Anne Grunseit, Romina Sesto
This project has received ethics approval.
The sponsor of this trial is the University of Sydney.
Funding is from the National Health and Medical Research Council.
The aim of this trial is to assess the effectiveness of the Ironbark fall prevention program on reducing the number of falls in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who are 45 years and older.
This group is compared to control participants who receive a healthy ageing program.
The Ironbark program includes interactive discussion about fall risk factors, combined with balance and strength training.
It was created after a successful New South Wales pilot and will now run across New South Wales, South Australia and Western Australia.
This study is not yet recruiting participants.
Lead investigator: Professor Rebecca Ivers
Investigator team: Professor Cathie Sherrington, Professor Anne Tiedemann
For more information on this George Institute for Global Health trial, please contact jcoombes@georgeinstitute.org.au.
This study is funded through the NHMRC.
We hope the findings of this project lead to enhanced promotion of physical activity by health professionals for people aged 50+ and people of all ages with a physical disability.
The aim of the project is to to collaboratively develop and test a strategy to support health professionals to promote PA to their patients – including older adults and children/adolescents/adults with physical disabilities – within their daily clinical practice.
The project is currently recruiting participants for phase one of the study-collaborative implementation strategy development.
In this phase we will conduct interviews, focus groups, workshops and surveys with health professionals, exercise providers and consumers to identify barriers to PA promotion and collaboratively develop the evidence-based implementation strategies and intervention elements.
Phase 2 of the study is a Type 2 hybrid effectiveness-implementation cluster randomised trial (2023 onwards).
In Phase 2 we will test the effectiveness of the implementation strategies and intervention elements in a Type 2 hybrid cluster randomised trial recruiting 800 participants across 30 sites.
Lead investigator: Professor Cathie Sherrington
Investigator team: Our team comprises of academics, public health experts and health economists from the University of Sydney, UNSW, Western Sydney University and Australian Catholic University, as well as multi-disciplinary clinicians from five Local Health Districts (Sydney, Western Sydney, South-Western Sydney, South-Eastern Sydney and Sydney Children Hospitals Network). Partner organisations include Disability Sport Australia, Australian Physiotherapy Association, Clinical Excellence Commission, iCare and Belgravia Leisure.
For more information about this project, please contact Kate Purcell.
This project has received ethics approval from Local Health District Ethics Committees and is being funded by an NHMRC Partnership Grant.
We hope the findings of this project lead to improved physical activity levels in adults who have difficulty walking.
The aim is to evaluate the effectiveness of two physical activity interventions on adults with self-reported walking difficulty.
The participant will be allocated to one of three groups.
The first intervention includes: a tailored physical activity plan based on a face-to-face assessment with a physiotherapist; six months of phone-based health coaching; use of technology to keep you active and access to online resources.
The second intervention is a less intensive health-coaching program involving a phone consultation with a physiotherapist, monthly text messages to follow up and access to online resources.
The third group will receive no intervention for the first six months and then receive the second intervention for the second six months.
The project will be conducted over 12 months.
This project is no longer recruiting.
Lead investigator: Professor Cathie Sherrington
Investigator team: Professor Anne Tiedemann, Professor Lisa Harvey, Associate Professor Leanne Hassett, Professor Rana Hinman, Professor Maria Crotty, Professor Tammy Hoffmann, Professor Nicholas Taylor
For more information about this project, please contact Associate Professor Leanne Hassett.
This is a NHMRC Project Grant (2018–2021).
We hope the findings of this project will lead to improved physical activity levels in patients receiving brief physical activity counselling as part of their physiotherapy treatment.
BEHAVIOUR is a hybrid type II cluster randomised controlled trial.
The aim is to evaluate the effectiveness of a multi-faceted implementation strategy compared to usual care on increasing the proportion of patients receiving brief physical activity counselling as part of hospital-based physiotherapy care, and subsequently improving the physical activity levels among these patients.
Physiotherapists in the intervention group will be assigned to receive the multi-faceted implementation strategy immediately to support them to incorporate brief physical activity counselling into their routine care.
The main implementation strategies will include education training, creating a learning collaborative, tailored strategies to address community referral barriers, facilitation and audit and feedback.
The control group will receive an updated version of the implementation strategy at the end of the trial.
The trial will be conducted with physiotherapists across all hospitals in South Western Sydney Local Health District and will include participants from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds.
Lead investigator: Associate Professor Leanne Hassett
Investigator team: Professor Cathie Sherrington, Professor Sarah Dennis, Professor Kirsten Howard, Dr Alison Pearce, Dr Marina Pinheiro, Professor Colin Greaves, Dr Bernadette Brady, Dr Lauren Christie, Matthew Jennings, Balwinder Sidhu
This study is funded through the MRFF preventive & public health grant (2020–2023) and NHMRC TRIP Fellowship (2019–2020).
We hope the findings of this project will lead to improved physical activity levels in people living with moderate to severe traumatic brain injury (TBI).
The aim of this project is to develop clinical practice guidelines for physical activity in people across all ages living with moderate-to-severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) in Australia.
A plan will also be developed for the effective implementation of these guidelines.
The first stage involves evaluating the fit of the 2020 WHO physical activity and sedentary behaviour guidelines for people living with disability to those living with a moderate-to-severe TBI.
This includes considering the evidence available regarding physical activity in TBI, preferences for physical activity, perspectives of relevant stakeholders and the feasibility of guideline implementation.
Stage two involves auditing brain injury rehabilitation services across Australia to understand how physical activity is delivered and promoted to identify current practice and where practice inconsistencies exist.
The third stage involves adapting the WHO guidelines into national clinical practice guidelines for people living with TBI, informed from stages one and two.
The final stage involves the development of a plan for implementation of these national practice guidelines based on the identification of barriers and facilitators.
Lead investigator: Associate Professor Leanne Hassett
Investigator team: Professor Cathie Sherrington, Professor Kirsten Howard, Professor Anne Tiedemann, Professor Emeritus Adrian Bauman, Associate Professor Grahame Simpson, Dr Abby Haynes, Professor Gavin Williams, Associate Professor Sean Tweedy, Professor Luke Wolfenden, Professor Maria Crotty, Associate Professor Adam Scheinberg, Gabrielle Vassallo Nick Rushworth
Collaborating Organisations: Brain Injury Australia, Connectivity TBI; icare NSW; Heads Together for ABI
Research team: Sakina Chagpar, Belinda Wang, Dr Liam Johnson
This study is funded through the MRFF 2020 Traumatic Brain Injury Mission, Stream 2-incubator (2021–2023).
Resources founded by members of this portfolio
Our research focuses on understanding the pathology and mechanisms of these conditions, characterising the clinical outcomes and needs related to these conditions and developing new treatments, services and management strategies to address these needs.
Our activities are underpinned by the principle of person-centredness and focused on outputs that impact the health of young people.
Some of the research programs currently explored by our investigators in this area include:
Our research encompasses the clinical, health services and population health research that is happening across the Flagship’s condition-specific research themes.
Our focus is on supporting the conduct of research to the highest standard, and to provide a network for those who are interested in this type of research.
Examples of the diverse research methodologies relevant to our theme include clinical trials, observational studies, health economic research and analysis of large datasets using data linkage and/or administrative datasets.
Several theme members hold externally funded fellowships, including:
and/or hold competitive NHMRC/MRFF grants, including
We're conducting research to understand:
Our vision is to define key processes, pathways and mechanisms that may be targeted to maintain or improve musculooskeletal health, and prevent, treat and one day cure the chronic, painful, disabling musculoskeletal diseases.
We aim to investigate the use of digital technologies to improve the quality and delivery of healthcare services.
The broad scope of our work includes innovative practices such as mobile health, health information technology, wearable devices, telehealth and virtual care.
Our research includes projects from any of the Flagship research groups that sit along the translational pipeline from basic sciences research to population health research, with an explicit focus on immediate or future implementation into healthcare policy or practice.
It particularly focuses on:
The Australian Arthritis and Autoimmune Biobank Collaborative (A3BC) is a national musculoskeletal and autoimmune biobanking network with state-of-the-art data collection, data linkage, big data analytics and machine-learning capabilities.
The PEDro, the Physiotherapy Evidence database is a free database of over 55,000 trials, reviews and guidelines evaluating physiotherapy interventions.
PEDro also has monthly emails known as Evidence in Your Inbox that you can sign-up for.
They are designed to inform you of the latest research included on PEDro across 15 areas of physiotherapy practice.
The DiTA, the Diagnostic Test Accuracy database is produced by the PEDro partnership.
It is a free database that indexes primary studies of diagnostic test accuracy and systematic reviews of diagnostic test accuracy studies related to physiotherapy practice.
DiTA also has a monthly Evidence in Your Inbox email that you can sign-up for.
By working collaboratively with clinicians, researchers, consumers and policy makers, we strive to improve care and health outcomes for people with musculoskeletal conditions.
We are currently recruiting participants for a number of trials across our Centre.
Please check the eligibility conditions carefully before applying for a trial. If you are ineligible for any of our current trials, please check back as this section is updated periodically.
PROPOSE study
The PROPOSE (Professional Referral to Physical Activity, Sport and Exercise) study is looking to interview people aged 50+ across Australia who have seen a physiotherapist in the past two years. Interviews will take approximately 30 minutes and will be conducted by phone or video call.
SUcceSS
SUcceSS is the world’s first randomised placebo-controlled study of decompression surgery for lumbar canal stenosis.
