Featured Speakers

Jillian Skinner has served as the Member for North Shore since 1994.

She has more experience in the health field than any other politician in Australia, having served as Shadow Minister for Health from 1995 and Minister for Health since 2011.

She also served as Deputy Leader of the NSW Parliamentary Liberal Party for six years.

Professor Johanna Westbrook, is Director of the Centre for Health Systems and Safety Research, Australian Institute of Health Innovation, Macquarie University. She is internationally recognized for her research evaluating the effects of information and communication technology (ICT) in health care. She has led national research on medication safety informatics, conducting comparative studies of electronic medication management systems, their effectiveness in reducing error rates, their propensity to introduce new errors, the cost-effectiveness of these systems and their impact on health professionals’ work. This research has received considerable national and international media attention and awards.

She has over 300 peer-reviewed publications, has been awarded more than $38M in grants and made over 100 national and international presentations. She is currently leading a large-scale study investigating the impact of ICT on the integration of community and aged care services. In 2014 she was named Australian ICT professional of the year by the Australian Information Industry Association for her research contributions.

Dr. Damian Claydon-Platt is the Chief Clinical Information Officer at Epworth Healthcare, a large not-for-profit healthcare group in Victoria. Damian is a medical doctor with 17 years clinical experience working predominantly in the Intensive Care Environment. As the CCIO of Epworth Healthcare, he is currently involved in the strategic alignment of IT priorities to clinical and organizational requirements, influencing of corporate vision to embrace the benefits of information technologies, stakeholder engagement across the group, and implementation of clinical-facing information systems.

Amelia’s background is in Data Integration, Data Governance, Master Data Management, Business & System Analytics and Mandatory Reporting for the Health Sector. Her passion lies in improving the integration of clinical systems and their configuration, to improve efficiencies with business processes and reporting of clinical data. Amelia has spent the last 2.5 years working at Chris O’Brien Lifehouse in various roles such as Project Managing the implementation of the PAS, Scheduling, Clinical Documents, Patient Billing, Referral Management and Business Intelligence Reporting applications for Lifehouse and is now the Project Director for the Clinical Systems and Electronic Medical Record.

Weis Lu’s experience lies in working with innovative technologies that bridge the gap between users and technology in health. He has spent the last 3.5 years at the Chris O’Brien Lifehouse as a Clinical Technology Specialist where he led the effort to successfully fit out clinical devices. He is passionate about healthcare innovations which will benefit the patients through the use of multidisciplinary technologies.

Tanya Felton is the National General Manager of Health Industry Development, Telstra. She has an extensive background in healthcare with a focus on technology and a passion for smarter, connected hospitals and health systems. Since 2011, Tanya has worked to build presence, profile and drive adoption of Telstra solutions across the Australian health care market.

Rachel de Sain is the founder of digital transformation agency, Flaxworks. With almost 20 years of experience in delivering innovative digital solutions around the globe for a range of clients in the public and private sector, including  MTV Networks, Accenture, Telstra. Rachel and her team have also delivered  a range of projects for federal, state and local government agencies, including the development of the eMental Health Policy, design and development of the aged care gateway and complete redesign and transformation of the federal health information services through Healthdirect.

She is a thought leader with the ability to bridge the gaps between technology, creative and business operations, helping clients understand the challenges they face and developing strategies to deliver digital transformation.

Rachel developed the “Lead by design, deliver by numbers” methodology her team of consultants deliver at Flaxworks, ensuring that digital transformation starts with the user needs, but always ensures accountability, delivering measurable outcomes that demonstrate value to the organization.

A passionate storyteller who had delivered the keynote address at a number of international conferences, Rachel weaves her experiences and insight through case studies into engaging and relatable examples that both educate and inspire audiences.

Bruce is the Executive Director of Information Services and Chief Information Officer responsible for ICT, applications and medical records at Bendigo Health. Bruce is also the Executive Sponsor for the new Bendigo Hospital ICT and EMR projects.

Bruce has been in the ICT industry since 1976 and has held several senior ICT roles within both the private and public sector. Bruce has pursued a lead role in specifying and supervising the delivery of new models for services in health and local government, and provided project management for a range of large projects funded by both State and Federal Government.

Outside of health, Bruce took a lead role in the development of Australia’s first regional telecommunications company in 1998 and was a founding Board member. Bruce also project managed the City of Greater Bendigo’s call centre campaign – Bendigo Calling – and the development of Central Victoria’s Innovation Park and was the inaugural Chair of the Central Victorian ICT Cluster – a State Government initiative to promote and develop the ICT industry in central Victoria. Bruce is also the chair of the iBendigo/Loddon Mallee Steering Group – a business and community group who advocate on behalf of the Loddon Mallee region for rollout of high speed broadband and development of digital community and smart city strategies.

Sue’s clinical background is in palliative care. She has also held NSW Senior executive roles in Clinical Governance at local health district level. She held an academic appointment as a clinical professor of nursing from 2000-2007. In her current role at Calvary Sue is responsible for clinical governance and clinical strategy across Calvary aged, community, acute public and private hospitals and specialist palliative care services in six Australian States and Territories.

Fiona Stuart is the Practice Principal for Healthcare within HP’s Industry Solutions area. In this role, she supports the go-to-market activities, business development and delivery for HP’s activities in the Healthcare sector. Fiona has over 25 years’ experience in ICT over a number of industries. She has specialized in Health since 2008. Fiona is an inaugural Certified Health Informatician Australasia (CHIA) and has previously practiced as a certified enterprise architect.

Simon Steele has a career that spans the IT and Telecommunications industries, where he has designed, implemented and supported large ERP software systems and designed and installed a wide-scale fixed wireless network for providing broadband services in regional Australia.

Simon joined HP in 2012 as a Solution Architect for the Royal Adelaide Hospital project. Simon is TOGAF 9 certified and is responsible for the solution design and design co-ordination of the in-building system integration at the Royal Adelaide Hospital’s new facility with Imatis, South Australian Health and other ICT vendors. Simon has been the Lead of the ICT Technical Workgroup incorporating lead solution engineers from all vendors involved in providing ICT at the Royal Adelaide Hospital’s new facility.

Judith Day has the role of Executive Director, Commercial Services and Business Systems (Deputy Chief Executive). Judith has worked at Cabrini for nine years. She is a Certified Practising Accountant and completed a Master of Business Administration from the University of Adelaide. Judith has approximately 20 years’ experience in the health sector. Previously, she was Director of Finance and Administration at St Andrew’s Hospital in Adelaide. Prior to that, she worked in various roles at Faulding Healthcare, Flinders Medical Centre and Ashford Community Hospital. Her responsibilities include Finance, Payroll, Information Technology, Business Intelligence, Health Information Services and Health Fund negotiations. As part of her role, Judith deputizes for the Chief Executive when he is on leave.

Tim Staker has the role of National General Manager of Cabrini Technology, a wholly owned division of Cabrini Health. He holds a Master of Business Administration (Technology Management) and Diploma in Biomedical Engineering. He has a keen interest in health technology planning and support and has worked as an equipment planning consultant on many of the new hospital developments in Australia. Cabrini Technology provides biomedical engineering support services to over 400 hospitals in Australia and New Zealand including Cabrini Health. Cabrini Technology also owns AWA Technology services, a 100 year old iconic brand which today provides national support to IT infrastructure and projects to government and enterprise.

Dr. Simon Kos is the Health Industry Manager for Microsoft in Australia.  Since 2010, he is responsible for the vision for health in Australia, and how Microsoft solutions and partners make that a reality.

Prior to joining Microsoft, Dr. Kos worked with global health IT companies Cerner and InterSystems as they implemented some of the largest e-Health initiatives in Australia.

Before moving into technology, Dr Kos worked as a medical doctor focused on critical care

Carmel Kennedy has over 20 years’ experience in management roles, 15 of those years in  senior management positions within the private hospital sector. Carmel completed her General Nursing Certificate, RNSH in Sydney in 1985. She then undertook a Post Graduate nursing certificate in spinal cord injuries at the NSW College of Nursing which she completed in 1987. In 1995 she completed her Masters in Business Administration at Wollongong University. In the same year, Carmel became Deputy Director of Nursing at Southern Highlands Private Hospital. She then moved to Westmead Private Hospital as the Clinical Services Manager. In 2004 she was promoted to the role of Director of Clinical Services.

Following her time at Westmead Private Hospital, she transitioned to Mt Wilga Rehabilitation Hospital where she was employed as both the Director of Clinical Services and CEO. Carmel has been the Director of Clinical Service at Macquarie University Hospital since March 2012 where she worked closely with the team to be one of the first Hospitals to achieve accreditation against all 10 of the NSQHS standards.

Eliza Kenny was part of the commissioning team of Macquarie University Hospital (MUH) in 2010, joining the Hospital as part of the nursing team.  Prior to commencing with MUH, Eliza had 15 years’ experience in the public health sector and led projects in clinical redesign and service realignment. Having moved into the Technology Services Team in 2011, Eliza took on the management of the Department in 2014. In May this year, Eliza led the implementation of TrakCare throughout the Hospital, this being the second CIS implementation she has played an integral role in.

Kevin Burbidge is an ICT Professional with over 20 years’ experience in ICT infrastructure architecture, design, and implementation. For the last five years, Kevin has been dedicated to delivery of Western Australia’s most technologically advanced public tertiary medical facility, the Fiona Stanley Hospital. During this time, he has worked for both the Western Australian Department of Health to define the ICT Services required in the hospital, and more recently for Serco Australia, the contracted Facilities Management provider at Fiona Stanley Hospital, to design and deliver ICT Services in the hospital.

Russel Withers is the Director of ICT at Western Australia’s flagship public hospital, Fiona Stanley Hospital, and has delivered ICT-centric programs of work for a variety of private sector and Government organizations across Australia, South East Asia, and the USA. Russel has worked in Healthcare  and Healthcare ICT since 2000. Prior to his joining the Serco team at Fiona Stanley Hospital, he was involved in the delivery of ICT infrastructure to the recently opened Gold Coast University Hospital. After joining Serco in mid-2013, he oversaw the commercial and technical aspects of implementing and commissioning of the complex ICT systems integrations required to deliver the ICT vision at Fiona Stanley Hospital.

Joanne is a highly experienced Health Informatician who has expertise in a wide range of areas. Specializing in patient journey modeling she has significant experience in managing healthcare improvement/ transformation projects involving both technical and clinical stakeholders using various technologies and involving complex organizational cultures. Joanne was responsible for designing the integration of four disparate clinical services into one integrated patient journey for the recently opened North West Cancer Centre in Tamworth NSW.

Lyn has more than 30 years of health experience. The last 15 in enabling Clinicians to utilize Information Technology through directing Clinical Programs delivered in Western Sydney and Nepean Blue Mountains Local Health Districts.