MCRI is Australia’s largest child health research institute and is ranked among the top three globally for research quality and impact. It has a team of over 1,800 researchers working across more than 150 common and rare diseases and conditions affecting infants, children and adolescents. Operating in a unique model with The Royal Children’s Hospital and the University of Melbourne, MCRI is part of a great circle of healthcare and discovery – helping transform child health from the labs to clinics and out into communities.
Concussion and brain injury is a cohesive and holistic paediatric research program at MCRI that aims to improve treatments and outcomes for children, the adults they will become, and their families.
The MCRI Concussion team has expertise in:
- Generating knowledge about concussion
- Community education
- Development of tools to diagnose and monitor concussion and its recovery
- Multidisciplinary treatments
Our senior leadership team have also developed local evidence-based child concussion guidelines and contributed to international child concussion guidelines and diagnostic tools – Child Sports Concussion Assessment Tool (SCAT) and Concussion Recognition Tool (CRT) – that have been published and widely disseminated by peak international bodies in the field including the Concussion in Sports Group.
Prof Vicki Anderson
Theme Director, Clinical Sciences Research, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute; Professorial Fellow, Psychological Sciences & Paediatrics, University of Melbourne
Prof Franz Babl
Head, Emergency Research, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute; Paediatric Emergency Physician, Royal Children’s Hospital
Dr Gavin Davis
Adjunct Professor, University of Notre Dame Australia; member of the Neurosurgical Society of Australasia (NSA); member of the AFL Concussion Working Group
Dr Audrey McKinlay
Psychologist, Research Fellow and Lecturer, Clinical Psychology, University of Melbourne; Adjunct Research Fellow, University of Canterbury, New Zealand
Vanessa Rausa
Clinical Neuropsychologist, Brain and Mind, Clinical Sciences Research, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute
Dr Michael Takagi
Research Officer, Clinical Neuropsychologist, Clinical Sciences Research, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute
Katie Davies
Principal Physiotherapist, Neurological Rehabilitation Group
Dr Simone Darling
Business Development Officer, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute
The MCRI team collaborated with Curve Tomorrow to design and build the HeadCheck app. Founded in 2009, Curve Tomorrow is a technology company that is passionate about changing the direction of health. Curve Tomorrow started in Melbourne, Australia and in 2014 expanded to Silicon Valley, California and more recently to Perth, India, Sri Lanka and France. Curve Tomorrow are embedded within a world leading hospital working side by side with health professionals, researchers and patients.
HeadCheck is widely available thanks to our partnership with the AFL. The app was launched nationally through AFL Junior Community Leagues to provide greater support to trainers and coaches in detecting concussion. The app is also included in the Level 1 First Aid trainers course managed by the AFL.