Dr Stephen Duckett is a health economist and an Honorary Enterprise Professor in the School of Population and Global Health and in the Department of General Practice at the University of Melbourne. He was responsible for the design and implementation of activity-based funding in Victoria, Australia in 1993 and subsequently was a consultant to Australia’s Independent Hospital Pricing Authority on the design of activity-based funding Australia-wide. Dr Duckett has held top health sector leadership positions in Australia and Canada and is a Fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia, and of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences.

Rob Heferen was appointed to the position of AIHW Chief Executive Officer, commencing in July 2021.

Prior to this, Mr Heferen was Deputy Secretary Higher Education, Research and International in the Department of Education, Skills and Employment. He has also served as Deputy Secretary, Energy at the Department of the Environment and Energy and had responsibility for energy policy including electricity and gas markets, and fuel security. Mr Heferen was also Australia’s representative on the International Energy Agency’s Governing Board.

In April 2016 Mr Heferen was Deputy Secretary with the Department of Industry, Innovation and Science with responsibilities for Energy, Resources and the Office of Northern Australia. Before joining the Department of Industry, Innovation and Science, Rob was the Deputy Secretary, Revenue Group at the Treasury from March 2011 – April 2016, with responsibility for tax policy, tax legislation and revenue forecasting. Mr. Heferen was first promoted to Deputy Secretary in 2010 to the Department Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, with responsibility for Indigenous Affairs.

Mr Heferen joined the Australian Public Service in 1989 as a graduate in the Australian Customs Service, worked at the Australian Taxation Office, and then had a number of years at the Treasury working on tax policy, Commonwealth/State financial relations and social policy.

Jennifer Mueller, MBA, RHIA, SHIMSS, FACHE, FAHIMA is the vice president and privacy officer at the Wisconsin Hospital Association Information Center, located in Madison Wisconsin. Prior to starting in this role, Ms. Mueller was the vice president and chief information officer at Watertown Regional Medical Center in Watertown Wisconsin.

She is an active participant in a number of professional organizations on both the national and Wisconsin levels. Nationally, she is a member of, and holds Fellow certifications from both the American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA) and the American College of Healthcare Executives (ACHE).  In Wisconsin, she is the Past-President (twice) of the Wisconsin Health Information Management Association (WHIMA), is active in the Wisconsin Chapter of the Health Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS), the HIPAA Collaborative of WI (HIPAACOW), and is on the board (Treasurer) of the Wisconsin Statewide Health Information Network (WISHIN). She completed a three-year term on the AHIMA board of directors in 2021 and is the 2023 current President/Chair. She has also received numerous awards during her career including WHIMA’s Rising Star Award, Motivator Award and the Distinguished member award.

Ms. Mueller is a registered health information administrator and earned both her BS in Health Information Management and her MBA from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

Professor Michael Kidd AM is Deputy Chief Medical Officer and Principal Medical Advisor with the Australian Government Department of Health and Aged Care, where he is leading Australia’s national primary care response to the COVID-19 pandemic. He also has appointment as the foundation Professor of Primary Care Reform at The Australian National University. He is a general practitioner, a past president of the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners, a past president of the World Organization of Family Doctors (WONCA), and a past Dean of the Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences at Flinders University.

Dr Kidong Park assumed the role of the Director of Data, Strategy and Innovation Group at the World Health Organization (WHO) Regional Office for the Western Pacific on 1 May 2022. Dr Park has extensive experience in global health, health policy and management, and strategic planning and evaluation. His international career in public health spans from high level representative roles to technical work on communicable disease control and health system strengthening.

Dr Park is a medical doctor and holds a Masters and PhD in Health Policy and Medicine from Seoul National University College of Medicine.

Jason Trethowan commenced as CEO of headspace, the National Youth Mental Health Foundation in January 2017. Since then he has overseen an expansion of the headspace network of digital services for young people, school-based programs, and an ongoing commitment to 164 headspace centres nationally. With strengthened community and government support for headspace, Jason understands the importance of embedding and integrating national models of service delivery in communities to ensure all young people across Australia can benefit from headspace services in the areas of mental health, general health, work and study, and alcohol and other drugs.
Prior to working at headspace, Jason held previous CEO positions from 2007 which included being CEO of Western Victoria Primary Health Network.
Jason is also a Board Director of Barwon Health and Gforce Employment Solutions, and has achieved qualifications in Health Information Management, Health Informatics, and a Master’s in Business Administration.

Executive Director, Workforce Strategy and Wellbeing, Commissioning and System Improvement Division, Department of Health

Jennifer is a leader in Future Workforce, Strategy and Planning and is currently delivering the 10-Year Health Workforce Strategy for Victoria. She is leading the Workforce Policy and Strategy area for the State working across the gamut of Health services. on improvements for the system, and leading engagement with the healthcare sector. She is the key advisor for Workforce for the Minister for Health and the Department Secretary to drive health workforce initiatives into the future.

Previous roles – Prior to working at the Dept of Health, she led strategy and workforce functions at Premier and Cabinet, Services Australia, the Australian Taxation Office and in the private sector ANZ Bank and CCH Publishing. She also worked as COO for a large NFP in Shepparton.

As the Head of workforce for the State she is focused on ensuring the longevity and health of our staff across the sector, as Health is a people business and our people matter! She also is an expert in Roadblox, pokemon, footy and hockey and built up this essential capability as a mother of two sons.

Kerri graduated in 2003 from Curtin University in Western Australia with a BSc Health Information Management. Over the past 15 years Kerri has been involved in oversight of Clinical System (ICT) Projects and Programs for Canberra Health Services. Currently Kerri is the Senior Director, Health Information Services at Canberra Health Services (CHS), she has moved into this role from being the CHS Digital Health Record (DHR) Readiness Lead which was part of the leadership team the delivered the new ACT Government Digital Health Record which centralised over 35 clinical and administrative systems into one electronic system. The CHS DHR Readiness program commenced in July 2021 and was integral to the successful delivery of the DHR on Saturday 12 November 2022. This role utilised Kerri’s past experience in project management of clinical systems and her HIM background.

Peter O’Halloran was appointed Chief Digital Officer of the Australian Digital Health Agency in February 2023. Prior to joining the Australian Digital Health Agency, Peter was the Chief Information Officer for ACT Health, overseeing the development and implementation of the Territory’s Digital Health Strategy 2019-2029. In November 2022, under Peter’s leadership, ACT Health implemented the Territory’s Digital Health Record based on Epic’s EMR platform.

Peter has been a Chief Information/Digital Officer in the healthcare portfolio in the public service since 2009 and has also held senior roles with the National Health & Medical Research Council and the National Blood Authority.

A Fellow of the Australasian Institute of Digital Health, a Fellow of the Institute of Managers and Leaders and a Board member of the Australian Computer Society, Peter is never bored and is always up to something.

Robert E. Johnson, III is the President/CEO and co-founder of Cimcor, Inc. Founded in 1997, Cimcor develops cutting-edge IT security software that takes real-time file change detection to the next level by offering instant remediation of changes. This unique software helps companies not only meet compliance and regulatory requirements but also continuously maintain compliance, stop zero-day attacks, protect valuable information, and help ensure 100% system uptime. Mr. Johnson is an inventor and has led the development of several patented technologies. As a result of his passion for technology, he has written numerous articles, contributed to books about technology, and developed several commercial software packages. Mr. Johnson has been the keynote speaker at several conferences and venues worldwide. He has appeared on World Business Review, Inside Indiana Business as well as Bloomberg Radio, and other media outlets. Mr. Johnson is actively involved in the community. He has served as a Board Member of the Purdue Technology Center of Northwest Indiana, a board member of the Methodist Hospital Foundation, and was appointed by the Governor of Indiana to the Board of Commissioners for the State Student Assistance Commission of Indiana (SSACI), was the Chairman of the Board for the Legacy Foundation and many more. Currently, Mr. Johnson serves on the Chancellor’s Council for Purdue University Northwest. In addition, Mr. Johnson is the Chairman of the Board for The Methodist Hospitals. Mr. Johnson also serves on the board of Finward Bancorp/Peoples Bank and is currently chair of the strategic planning committee.
In 2021, Cybercrime Magazine identified Cimcor as one of the `Hot 150 Cybersecurity Companies to Watch` globally. In 2023, Mr. Johnson was appointed by the U.S. Secretary of Commerce to the Indiana District Export Council. In addition, in 2023, Mr. Johnson was selected as one of the `250 Most Influential Leaders in Indiana” by the Indiana Business Journal. The same year, Mr. Johnson was inducted into the Purdue University Northwest Alumni Hall of Fame.

Associate Professor Alka Kothari is a Senior Staff Specialist in Obstetrics and Gynaecology and the Conjoint Site-Coordinator of the Northside Clinical Unit, Faculty of Medicine, University of Queensland, at Redcliffe Hospital, Queensland, Australia. She is passionate about encouraging multi-disciplinary research in perinatal mental health, women’s imaging, critical care and medical education and publishes her research in international journals. A/Prof Kothari is particularly interested in research involving national data linkage and has received approximately AUD 5 million in total research grant funding.

Associate Professor Kothari has received various research excellence, leadership and teaching awards and is regularly invited to speak at international and national conferences. She is completing a PhD on ‘Forgotten Fathers in Pregnancy and Childbirth”, for which she won the best oral presentation in perinatal mental health at the World Congress in Obstetrics and Gynaecology in London in 2019. She passionately advocates for fathers and partners, providing expert guidance and support to several non-government fatherhood organisations nationally. Additionally, A/Prof Kothari is an examiner for the Royal Australasian and New Zealand College of Obstetricians & Gynaecologists and The University of Queensland and is a member of the Prince Charles Human Research and Ethics Committee.

Professor Wullschleger has also large experience in health and trauma system development and is appointed as Co-Chair of the Queensland Trauma Clinical Network by Healthcare Improvement Unit (Queensland Health), and Chair of the Queensland Trauma Committee of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons).

Associate Professor David Fielding is a physician at the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital where he did his undergraduate training. He subspecialised in Thoracic Medicine with a focus on bronchoscopy, helping to create a large interventional service here. Part of that inlcuded instituting endobronchial ultrasound (EBUS), an Australian first, in 2003. This has become standard of care for diagnosing lung cancer.

Dr Fielding’s research has been centred on how specimens from EBUS can be optimised. With strong collaboration between UQCCR, Pathology Queensland and QIMR Berghofer, the work has expanded on 2 fronts

1. use of simple cytology smears as the source for panel molecular testing and

2. The expanded role of WES and WGS on these samples.

Where they have instituted a large Australia wide collaborative network who are collecting samples along with The Debutant Studies. Associate Professor David Fielding has Cancer Council Australia/CCQ/ and NHMRC grants fr these studies

Dr Homayoun Jalali is a cardiothoracic surgeon specialising in cardiac surgery. He has a clinical interest in aortic valve, aortic root and mitral valve repair, as well as congenital heart disease and atrial fibrillation.

Having completed his medical and surgical degrees with honours from the University of Liège in Belgium, Homayoun undertook his specialist cardiothoracic training in Belgium before travelling to the UK to complete further training in congenital cardiothoracic surgery.

Homayoun currently consults at hospitals across Brisbane and has held the positions of Senior Lecturer at the University of Queensland, and Senior Lecturer in Cardiothoracic Adult and Paediatric Surgery at the University of Leuven in Belgium.

In 1987, Matt Levy was born prematurely at 25 weeks. He has cerebral palsy, is legally blind, and has had 40-50 operations on his heart, lungs, ears, and even brain.

Matt is also a swimmer. You might have seen him win gold for Australia. He has competed at five consecutive Paralympic Games, winning 3 gold 1 silver, and 5 bronze medals. He’s also swam at 5 World Swimming Championships – winning 20 international medals and holding 4 World Records.

Matt has a degree in Business (Management), an Australian Institute of Company Directors qualification and MBA (Leadership), as well as an Order of Australia Medal (OAM) for services to sport.