Suicide & Self-harm Prevention Conference 2012

John Brady

John is married with five children. He has been with MATES in Construction Queensland for the past four years and is the Operations Manager. He helped develop the national award winning ‘MATES in Construction’ program in suicide prevention. John also coordinates a Life Skills Tool Box program which is a resilience building program for apprentices in the Queensland construction industry. John strongly believes that suicide is a preventable problem particularly if we can get ‘mates helping mates.’ John comes from a diverse work background. He has spent 20 years as a school principal. He owns a wine company, a leadership and management consultancy and has spent many years coaching young men in sport. John also spends 6 to 8 weeks a year in Central Africa conducting leadership programs and establishing micro economic projects in poor communities.

Thomas Brideson

Tom Brideson is a Kamilaroi man who was born in Gunnedah, NSW. Since 2007 Tom is the NSW State-wide Coordinator of the Aboriginal Mental Health Workforce Program. Tom has a broad interest in areas that require improvements for Aboriginal people including health policy development, social and emotional wellbeing, clinical mental health care, suicide prevention including education and research interests across these areas. Tom has published a number of journal articles on issues facing the Aboriginal mental health workforce and the NSW Aboriginal Mental Health Workforce Program. Tom sits on a range of Committee’s at the Local, State and National levels. Tom is the recent elected Chair of management committee of the Mental Health Services Conference (TheMHS), and convened the TheMHS Summer Forum in 2008, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Mental Health. In 2011 Tom was appointed to the first National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Suicide Prevention Advisory Group. In November 2011 Tom was appointed to the NSW Suicide Prevention Ministerial Advisory Committee.

Associate Professor Jane Burns

Associate Professor Jane Burns is the Chief Executive Officer of the Young and Well CRC (YAW-CRC). The establishment of the CRC is a culmination of Jane’s work in suicide and depression prevention over the last decade which has focused on international and national partnerships with academic, government, corporate, philanthropic, not-for-profit and community sectors.
Jane holds a VicHealth Principal Research Fellowship at Orygen Youth Health Research Centre, Centre for Youth Mental Health at the University of Melbourne and an Honorary Fellowship at the Brain & Mind Research Institute, University of Sydney. She was a Commonwealth Fund Harkness Fellow in 2004–2005 at the University of California, San Francisco. She joined beyondblue: the national depression initiative in its start up phase and established and managed the youth agenda. Jane completed her PhD in Medicine (Psychiatry and Epidemiology) at the University of Adelaide.

Professor Helen Christensen

Helen Christensen is Executive Director of the Black Dog Institute and a Professor of Mental Health at the University of New South Wales, a National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Senior Principal Research Fellow, a member of the Academy of Social Sciences, Australia, the President of the Australasian Society for Psychiatric Research, and the immediate past President of the International Society for Research in Internet Interventions. She is recognized as an international leader in epidemiology, public mental health and e health. She has over 300 research publications, and has produced a number of e mental health web applications, including MoodGYM, which is used by over 450,000 individuals globally as a means of lowering depression. She has received over 8 state and national awards for her work in providing e health services directly to consumers through the web. 
As Director of the Black Dog Institute, Helen aims to facilitate the Black Dog’s mission to lower depression in the community by providing the highest quality information, assessment, clinical and prevention services. The Black Dog Institute aims to be the best translational facility in Australia for Mood Disorders. She also endeavours to continue to build the research capability of the Black Dog Institute and to develop a critical mass of researchers whose research interests focus on the implementation of proven mental health programs.

General Peter Cosgrove

General Peter John Cosgrove AC, MC (born 28 July 1947) is a retired Australian Army officer. He was the chief of the Defence Force from July 3, 2002 to July 3, 2005, when he retired from active service. On March 23, 2006 Cosgrove was selected to lead the Queensland Government taskforce of rebuilding communities damaged by Cyclone Larry, a category five tropical cyclone that devastated the Innisfail region of northern Queensland. In recognition of the important contribution General Cosgrove made to the community of north Queensland following Cyclone Larry, on October 11, 2008 Queensland Premier Anna Bligh announced that the new residential suburb in the Bohle Plains area of Townsville would be named Cosgrove.

Professor Diego De Leo

Professor De Leo’s research expertise includes definitional issues in suicidology, culture and suicide, international trends and national suicide prevention programs.

He has published extensively with over 700 publications, including 230 peer-reviewed articles, 145 book chapters and 34 volumes. His H­graph is today 29, but has been consistently above 20 in the past five years.

He is Past President of the International Association for Suicide Prevention and the International Academy for Suicide Research. He serves as a board member of the Australian Suicide Prevention Advisory Council (ASPAC) and is Chair of the Advisory Committee to the Queensland Government Suicide Prevention Strategy. Prof. De Leo has successfully established and managed many high-level international collaborations, which have resulted in the creation of seven collaborative studies including the WHO/EURO Multicentre Study on Suicidal behaviour, the WHO/SUPRE-MISS (Suicide Prevention – Multisite Intervention Study on Suicide) and the WHO/START Study Project (Suicide Trends in At-Risk Territories).

He is founder/co-founder of the Italian Society for PsychoOncology, the Italian Association for Suicide Prevention and the International Academy for Suicide Research. He is the ideator and main promoter of organizing the World Day for Suicide Prevention, taking place every September 10th since its establishment in 2003.

He is currently the Editor in Chief of Crisis: The Journal of Crisis Intervention and Suicide Prevention, and editorial board member of Suicide & Life­Threatening Behaviour, Archives of Suicide Research, Suicidology­on­Line and Advancing Suicide Prevention. He is Associate Editor of BMC Public Health, and Regional Editor of Behavioural Medicine. In addition, he is a member of the editorial boards of several other journals including Journal of Affective Disorders, Aging Clinical and Experimental and the Open Geriatric Journal, plus several Italian medical journals.

He is the winner of several national and international awards. He won the IASP Stengel Award when he was just 40-years‐old, and Life Research Award (Suicide Prevention - Commonwealth of Australia) in 2007. He is a Gold Medal, Italians in the World. His most recent award was the AAS Louis I. Dublin award (a lifetime achievement award for outstanding services/contributions to the field of suicide prevention as evidenced by leadership,devotion and creativity) in 2011.

Dr Michael Dudley

Dr Michael Dudley is co-Chair of Suicide Prevention Australia, and has chaired Suicide Prevention Australia since 2001. He is senior staff specialist in psychiatry at Prince of Wales and Sydney Children’s Hospitals, and conjoint senior lecturer in psychiatry at University of New South Wales. He is a member of the Australian Suicide Prevention Advisory Committee (ASPAC), the Department of Immigration and Citizenship’s Mental Health Advisory Sub-Group, and the Advisory Board of Inspire Foundation’s ‘Reach Out!’ Program. He has long-standing clinical, public health and research interests in suicide, self-harm and depression among adolescents and young adults, including indigenous people and refugees. He is principal editor (with co-editors Professor Derrick Silove and Dr Fran Gale) of a peer-reviewed international textbook on mental health and human rights, to be published by Oxford University Press in June 2012.

Jorgen Gullestrup

Jorgen Gullestrup was born in Denmark and migrated to Australia in 1988 where he worked on various construction sites in Brisbane, followed by 13 years as a union official with the Plumbers Union. During his period as Secretary of the Plumbers Union he became passionate about preventing suicide within the industry. Jogen is CEO of MATES in Construction (MIC) which is a suicide prevention program developed by the Queensland building and construction industry for the industry.

Cameron Howlett

Cameron is the male College Captain at St Mary's Catholic College, Cairns. Being a third year member of the Cairns YEA! Youth Council, and the current Youth Member For Mulgrave in The YMCA Queensland Youth Parliament, Cameron does his best to maintain an active role in the community and give youth a voice.

Adjunct Professor Ernest Hunter

Ernest Hunter is an Australian medical graduate trained in adult, child and cross cultural psychiatry in the United States before returning to work in Indigenous health in the mid-1980s. He has undertaken research in the Kimberley and Far North Queensland and is currently Adjunct Professor with James Cook University and Regional Psychiatrist with the Remote Area Mental Health Service providing outreach to Aboriginal communities of Cape York from Cairns.

Associate Professor Myfanwy Maple

Dr Myfanwy Maple is an Associate Professor and coordinator of social work in the School of Health at the University of New England in Armidale, New South Wales. She is Deputy Lead of the Collaborative Research Network for Mental Health in Rural and Regional Communities thematic area on Self Care and Mental Health. Dr Maple’s research focuses on the experience and needs of those who have experienced the suicide death of a loved one, with several active projects examining aspects of this experience with a variety of populations and sub-groups. She supervises both doctoral and masters students undertaking their research in the area of suicide, bereavement and mental health. In 2007, Myfanwy was awarded the Emerging Researcher Award from Suicide Prevention Australia on World Suicide Prevention Day for her work toward understanding the experience of family members affected by suicide death. She has published in national and international journals in the area of suicide bereavement. Myfanwy is serving her third appointment by the NSW Minister for Health as an Official Visitor under the NSW Mental Health Act (2007).

Professor Graham Martin 

Professor Graham Martin OAM, MD, MBBS, FRANZCP, DPM, MRCGP is Director of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at The University of Queensland, and Clinical Director, Royal Children’s Hospital and Health Service District, Child and Youth Mental Health Service (CYMHS). He is currently a member of the Lifeline Research Advisory Board, chairs the Research Advisory Committee for RUOK?, is on the Boards of Mates in Construction, the Inspire Foundation, the Centre for Youth Substance Abuse Research (UQ) and PsychWire. Graham is director of the Centre for Suicide Prevention Studies in Young People (UQ).

Graham has been dedicated to suicide prevention since 1987, a member of the International Association for Suicide Prevention since 1997, and a member by invitation of the International Association for Suicide Research. He has been a member of the Advisory Council Australian National Youth Suicide Prevention Strategy and Evaluation Working Group (1994-99), writing team for the Australian Suicide Prevention Strategy (2000 and 2007), National Advisory Council for Suicide Prevention (2003-8), and is a National Advisor on Suicide Prevention to the Australian Government (2009 to date).

Graham was Suicide Prevention Australia (SPA) chairman (1995-2001), convened 6 national suicide prevention conferences, led the team developing the first Media and Suicide Resource Kit (‘Achieving the Balance’, 1998), and became a Life Member of SPA in 2004. He was awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia (2006), a ‘Jackstar’ award for 10 years contribution to Inspire Foundation’s ‘ReachOut’ program (2007), the 2008 SPA ‘Lifetime Contribution to Suicide Prevention Research’ award, and the Rowe-Zonta International Prize (2010).
Graham was an originator of the Australian Network for Promotion, Prevention and Early Intervention program (Auseinet, 1997-2009), and Director until 2001. He is Editor in Chief for the online journal AMH (Advances in Mental Health, formerly the Australian eJournal for the Advancement of Mental Health amh.e-contentmanagement.com

In his spare time Graham trained for 20 years in Karate, is a Nidan black belt with Hoshindo Karate International (grading in Japan - JKF, 2008). Two years ago he was paralysed from the waist down due to a spinal cord problem. The story of his recovery (a book called ‘Taking Charge: a journey of recovery’) can be read at here. He has dreams of returning to Karate.

Graham has successfully advised 9 completed doctoral studies, and currently supervises 2 fulltime and 7 part time UQ higher degree students. He has an active research program focused on non-suicidal self-injury as a gateway to suicide prevention in young people.

Andrew Matthews

Andrew Matthews is an international speaker on “attitude”, “being happy”, “success” and “prosperity”. In the field of motivation and personal development, his books, “Being Happy!” and “Follow Your Heart” are classics. 
Over 1 million people have attended Andrew’s seminars and keynote speeches across Australia, Asia and North America. His presentations are laced with humour and he draws lightning-fast cartoons as he speaks!  He entertains while providing audiences with the tools and inspiration to live more successful and more prosperous lives.
Andrew Matthews’ books are now published in 42 languages with sales of over 7 million copies in 60 countries.  He has appeared on 3,000 radio and TV programs on 4 continents.

Sandra Palmer

Sandra Palmer is the Clinical Manager of CASA’s Community Postvention Response Service (CPRS) in New Zealand, which is a Ministry of Health funded service. Her team’s focus is on supporting communities when there are emerging or actual suicide clusters or suicide contagion. This team is one of the only national teams responding to national clusters and they are developing a wealth of information, knowledge and experience in this cluster response area. Sandra has been working in the postvention area for six years and has a strong belief in the notion of postvention being a strong suicide prevention tool. She has also worked in the field of suicide prevention as part of the Towards Wellbeing programme funded by CYFS (Child Youth and Family Services) in New Zealand. Her current roles combine her clinical passions – working in postvention, working with communities and focusing on the wellbeing of young people and youth. She graduated from the University of Auckland in 1992 with a MA (Hons) in Psychology.

Senator Rachel Siewert

Senator Rachel Siewert is a dynamic member of the Australian Greens in Parliament who works hard for people both at home in WA and across the country.
Rachel is the Australian Greens Whip, Chairs the Senate Community Affairs References Committee and is a member of the Expert Panel on Constitutional Recognition of Indigenous Australians.

Rachel was first elected to the Senate at the 2004 election and commenced her term in July 2005, quickly gaining a reputation as an assertive and hard working member of the Senate.

She is one of ten Australian Greens MPs in the current Parliament and together, they have established a track record of positive, solution-focused negotiations with all parties in Parliament. In addition to her work in Perth and Canberra, Rachel regularly visits the regions and remote communities to discuss critical social, health, agricultural and environmental issues.

Coming from an agricultural science background prior to entering the Senate, Rachel spent sixteen years as the Coordinator of the Conservation Council of Western Australia. As a Senator she continues to have a highly productive working relationship with non-government organisations across many sectors throughout Australia, providing a critical link between Parliament and our communities.

Rachel is currently working to establish a network of marine sanctuaries around Australia, introduce much needed reforms and improvements to aged care services, increase funding for mental health and preventive health measures nationwide and to improve the opportunities and life expectancy of Indigenous Australians.

Portfolios

• Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Issues
• Ageing
• Agriculture
• Family, Community & Disability Services
• Fisheries & Marine
• Natural Resource Management
• The Kimberley & Northern Australia