The Collaboration for Evidence, Research and Impact in Public Health (CERIPH), the new entity that was the WA Centre for Health Promotion Research (WACHPR), was launched with enthusiasm and a little reverence in mid-February.
CERIPH builds on the thirty year legacy of WACHPR, which was the first health promotion research centre in the southern hemisphere when it was established in 1986. CERIPH brings together an expert multi-disciplinary research collaboration grounded in the School of Public Health at Curtin University. CERIPH is primed and ready to develop new collaborations and innovative health promotion practice and research across Australia and into the Asia-Pacific region.
The CERIPH event launch, Evidence into Action: Health Promotion Insights, was attended by over fifty delegates from government, non-government and university research centres. The delegates were delighted to have the opportunity to hear and interact with two eminent international keynote speakers: Professor Lawrence Green, the creator of the PRECEDE-PROCEED Model, and Professor Elizabeth Waters from the University of Melbourne.
Professor Green’s insightful presentation, titled Health Promotion’s Odyssey from Theory to Research to Practice and Policy, discussed the history of health promotion and the disconnect that can exist between researchers, practitioners and policy makers.
Larry’s presentation segued perfectly into that of Professor Liz Water’s discussion on Knowledge Translation: How, What, and With Whom is Driving Improvements in Public Health Research and Practice Evidence. Liz is the Director of the Jack Brockhoff Child Health & Wellbeing Program and Director of Public Health Insight at the University of Melbourne. She emphasised the importance of the nexus between research and practice to ensure sound public health outcomes.
The Western Australian research perspective was also well presented and received through the informed presentations by Dr Jo Clarkson, Director of Health Promotion at Healthway and Curtin’s Faculty of Health Sciences Dean of Research, Professor Garry Allison.
Jonine Jancey, Director of CERIPH, says: “It was a memorable event as the launch celebrated the Collaboration’s rich history, its existing partnerships, its unique collaborative research approach, and its expertise in capacity building, highlighting its aim to build further collaborations, especially in the Asia Pacific region.”
Professor Bruce Maycock, Head of the School of Public Health, believes the collaboration offers great opportunities.
“This is an exciting time for School of Public Health as the new collaboration, CERIPH, captures the increased potential of evidence and impact in public health research. The collaboration has evolved from WACHPR, a research centre that had a revered national profile earned over the years,” he says.
“CERIPH has the expertise and capacity to facilitate ongoing collaborations with existing and new industry links at a local, national and international level.”
CERIPH will continue to conduct robust health promotion research and practice with partners, build health promotion capacity through the provision of health promotion short courses to industry and influence national and international health promotion policy and practice.
“The establishment of CERIPH comes at a time when the School of Public Health is peaking, recruiting internationally recognised epidemiologists, health economists and health service research managers,” Professor Maycock says.
With a redefined mission and sense of purpose, CERIPH epitomises the confidence and commitment to the future of health promotion and public health at Curtin University.
Visit the CERIPH website for more details.
Keynote speakers
Professor Lawrence Green
Before joining the University of California, San Francisco in 2004, Professor Green was Director of the Office of Science and Extramural Research and Director of the World Health Organization Global Tobacco Control Collaborating Center for the Centers for Disease Control. He has been on the full-time public health and/or medical faculties at Berkeley, Johns Hopkins, Harvard, Texas, and the University of British Columbia. He was the first Director of the federal Office of Health Promotion, Physical Fitness and Sports Medicine under the Carter Administration and a Vice President of the Kaiser Family Foundation. He has also been a consultant to the World Health Organization and health research foundations of Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, the Netherlands and Denmark.
He has published several books, including textbooks on health education planning, evaluation and community health, and over 300 articles on issues in the health educational, social and behavioral aspects of health services and public health. He served on the founding U.S. Preventive Services Task Force and now on the Task Force on Community Preventive Services.
Professor Green was elected in 2009 to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies, and currently chairs the IOM committee on Evaluating the Nation’s Progress in Obesity Prevention.
Professor Elizabeth Waters
Professor Elizabeth Waters’ career in public health began in the mid-1990s. A background in science, nursing and exposure to global health issues had provoked an interest in preventative health, which, having been further stirred by her Master’s in Public Health study, led her to closely examining child health and wellbeing.
Equipped with experience at the Royal Children’s Hospital, VicHealth, Oxford and Deakin Universities, Professor Waters arrived at the University of Melbourne in 2007 with an established team of researchers passionate about government and community partnership approaches to preventative health. Professor Elizabeth Waters is currently the Jack Brockhoff Chair of Child Public Health, Director of the Jack Brockhoff Child Health and Wellbeing Program and Director of Public Health Insight.
