Our team
This CRE builds on our established and highly successful program of blood cancer research, leverages our existing infrastructure and networks, and engages new research, clinical and community collaborators.
For the first time, this CRE provides a dedicated ‘home’ and coordinating centre for Australian supportive care research focussed on blood cancers. It brings together people with lived experience, leading researchers across key disciplines, and professional networks with our clinical trials, registries, laboratory analyses, health economic assessment and novel research methodologies.
Chief Investigators
Professor Zoe McQuilten
Principal Investigator, Monash University
Professor Erica Wood AO
Chief Investigator, Monash University
Professor Claire Rickard
Chief Investigator, University of Queensland
Professor Meera Agar
Chief Investigator, University of Technology Sydney
Prof Zoe McQuilten is a consultant haematologist and Tony Charlton Chair of Oncology at Alfred Health and Monash University. She is Head of the Cancer Research Program and Deputy Director of the Transfusion Research Unit, School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine at Monash University.
Prof Erica Wood AO is a Haematologist and Transfusion Medicine Specialist. She is Head of the Transfusion Research Unit and Co-Director of the Division of Acute and Critical Care in the School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine at Monash University. She is an NHMRC Leadership Fellow (Level 2), and leads the NHMRC-funded Blood Synergy research program and the NHMRC OPTIMAL Centre of Research Excellence in improving immunoglobulin use.
Prof Rickard is an NHMRC Leadership 2 Fellow and esteemed nurse researcher. She has completed over 50 randomised controlled trials and focuses on preventing healthcare associated infections and other complications for people with central, peripheral, venous and arterial catheters. As a Registered Nurse, she specialized in acute and critical care, and then coordinated pharmaceutical and investigator-initiated ICU research at the Royal Brisbane and Women's Hospital.
Prof Agar is Director of the Centre for Improving Palliative, Aged and Chronic Care through Clinical Research and Translation, NHMRC Investigator Fellow (leadership 1) and Professor of Palliative Medicine, University of Technology Sydney, I am privileged to lead a team of >30 researchers who conduct interdisciplinary collaborative research in partnership with consumers to optimise care for those with cancer and chronic illness. I am in active clinical practice as a senior palliative care physician, and research lead for South West Sydney Local Health District Palliative Care Service.
Professor Eliza Hawkes
Chief Investigator, Monash University
Dr Andrea Henden
Chief Investigator, University of Queensland
Professor Jason Roberts
Chief Investigator, University of Queensland
Professor Dennis Petrie
Chief Investigator, Monash University
Prof Hawkes (MBBS Hons, FRACP, DMedSc) is the Clinical Lymphoma Lead and Steering committee member of the national Lymphoma and Related Diseases Registry in School of Public Health & Preventive Medicine at Monash University. She also holds the roles of Chief Clinical Research Officer at the Olivia Newton-John Cancer Research & Wellness Centre and Lead of the Lymphoma service at Austin Health and in Melbourne Australia.
Dr Andrea Henden is an early career clinician scientist. She is currently a research officer in the Translational Cancer Immunotherapy Laboratory, developing CAR T cell therapies for blood cancers. Dr Henden also holds a position as a staff specialist in Haematology and Bone Marrow Transplantation at the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital. Her current research spans both clinical research and translational and basic science research, with the goal of ultimately improving outcomes for patients with malignant haematological disorders.
Prof Jason Roberts is Director of the University of Queensland Centre for Clinical Research (UQCCR), an Australian National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Leadership Fellow L2 at The University of Queensland. He is also a Consultant Clinical Pharmacist at the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital and Interim Director of the Herston Infectious Diseases Institute (HeIDI). He is Director of the NHMRC-funded Centre for Research Excellence RESPOND which is based at UQCCR. He is a clinician-scientist with a strong interest in research and his principal research theme is optimization of antimicrobial dosing in the critically ill.
Dennis is a Professor in the Centre for Health Economics, Monash University. He has published extensively on the economics of illicit drugs and alcohol, disability, cancer, the longitudinal measurement and evaluation of health inequalities and has lead a large number of economic evaluations of healthcare interventions including alongside RCTs. He specialises in analysing large and complex data sets to improve health policy decisions with a focus on reducing health inequities.
Associate Professor Claudia Rutherford
Chief Investigator, University of Sydney
Dr Thao Le
Chief Investigator, Monash Univesity
Prof Claudia Rutherford is a clinical research methodologist with experience in health outcomes measurement, psychometrics, and clinical study design. For over 20 years, Claudia has specialised in patient-reported outcomes (PROs), including health-related quality of life (HRQL) and symptom burden in research and clinical practice. Her expertise in PRO science spans the research process, covering study design, measurement, analysis, interpretation and reporting of PROs. Claudia also has experience in conducting systematic reviews, multi-centre qualitative and quantitative research, developing and evaluating PRO measures, and cross-cultural and linguistic translation of PRO measures across multiple health conditions.
Dr Thao Le is a clinical trial statistician and Senior Research Fellow at the School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, Monash University. She leads the statistical work within the Blood Transfusion Research Unit and holds a joint position with the Australian Trial Methodology Network (AusTriM).
Associate Investigators
Dr Aleece MacPhail
Early Career Researcher, Monash University
Dr Sarah Anderson
Early Career Researcher, RBWH Queensland
Dr Catriona Parker
Early Career Researcher, Monash University
Dr Adam Irving
Early Career Researcher, Monash University
Dr Aleece MacPhail is an Australian-based health professional. Aleece is trained as an Infectious Diseases Specialist.
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Dr Parker is an Early Career Research Fellow at Monash University in the Transfusion Research Unit and holds research interests in patient experience and outcomes, utilising qualitative and mixed-methods expertise to provide novel insights.
Dr Irving is an early-career health economist and research fellow with experience and interest in evaluating the impact of interventions designed to encourage the judicious use of scarce resources, performing economic evaluations using clinical trial or observational data, and research in haematology and haematological malignancy.
Dr Allison Mo
Early Career Researcher, Monash University
Professor Orla Morrissey
Senior Associate Investigator, Alfred Hospital
Professor Andrew Spencer
Senior Associate Investigator, Alfred Hospital
Professor Rory Wolfe
Senior Associate Investigate, Monash University
Dr Allison Mo is a clinical and laboratory haematologist with an interest in transfusion, anaemia, haemostasis and thrombosis. She is a fellow with the Royal College of Pathologists of Australasia (RCPA) and the Royal Australasian College of Physicians (RACP).
Professor Orla Morrissey is an Infectious Diseases Physician at Alfred Health, Melbourne and Senior Lecturer in the Department of Infectious Diseases at Monash University, Melbourne. Professor Morrissey is a lead clinician within the Immunocompromised Host Consult Service at Alfred Health.
Prof Andrew Spencer is Head of the Malignant Haematology, Transplantation and Cellular Therapies Service at The Alfred Hospital, Professor of Haematology at Monash University and Head of the Myeloma Research Group, all in Melbourne, Australia. Professor Spencer undertook his medical training in clinical and laboratory hematology at the Princess Alexandra Hospital, Brisbane, and the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Sydney.
Prof Rory Wolfe has been a biostatistician at Monash since 2000 and contributes to a wide range of epidemiological, public health and clinical research including cohort studies and clinical trials. He also leads research on aspects of statistical methodology as applied to health research. Rory is the Statistical Director of the Monash University Clinical Trials Centre. He is also Head of the Australian Trials Methodology Research Network, and a member of the Statistical Society of Australia. He has delivered postgraduate coursework for the Biostatistics Collaboration of Australia and Monash University for many years.
Consumer Investigators
Vanessa Yenson
Pam Keirs
As the first adult in Australia to receive a cord blood transplant in 1999, Vanessa has a unique place in medical history. Today, she brings that profound lived experience with acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (AML) to her work with Cancer Symptom Trials and as a consumer representative for the BloodCare CRE, dedicated to championing patient-centred research and improving the lives of others through clinical research.
An experienced Quality Management and policy professional across the disability and pharmaceutical sectors, Pam is an acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (AML) survivor who underwent a stem cell transplant in 2005. Having successfully navigated both acute and chronic graft-versus-host disease, she brings a deeply informed perspective to her professional work and to her role as a consumer representative for the BloodCare CRE, ensuring the patient voice remains at the heart of healthcare standards.
Staff and Students
Dr Claire Marceaux
Program Manager, Monash University
Jessie Lu-Lee
Communications and Engagement Manager, Monash University
PhD Student
Monash University
PhD Student
Monash Univesity
Claire is Program Manager of the NHMRC-funded BloodCare Centre of Research Excellence (CRE) in supportive care research for patients with blood cancer. She works closely with researchers, clinicians, consumer groups and key stakeholders across Australia with the aim of generating new knowledge and research capacity to better support patient's care. Claire previously worked in cancer research at Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research (WEHI) and led team and project management in spatial imaging research technologies (WEHI and ONJCRI).
Jessie also contributes to major malaria research initiatives at the Burnet Institute and The University of Melbourne, including the Malaria Synergy Program and the Australian Centre of Research Excellence in Malaria Elimination (MASTER-MAP). She brings extensive experience across the health, research, and not-for-profit sectors, with a strong focus on project management, stakeholder engagement, and program coordination. She has a background spanning clinical research environments and large-scale program delivery, with qualifications in psychological science, counselling, and event management, supporting her interdisciplinary approach to research translation and capacity building.
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