Every Week Counts Showcase Canberra

Recently Amber travelled to Parliament House, Canberra for the Every Week Counts Showcase. She was honoured to be the opening speaker of the event to discuss The Power of Consumers in the Collaborative. Amber has been a member of the Consumer Advisory Group since it’s inception and has been working with the WA groups for many years. More than 300 people attended this event from 65 hospitals all over Australia.

The Collaboratives initiatives for safely lowering the rates of earlyterm and preterm birth can be found here. So far participating hospitals have seen a marked improvement in their rates of earlyterm and preterm birth but there is still a lot of work to do! We are hopeful that future funding will enable more hospitals to participate in the program in the future.

Telethon Kids Institute Connect Launch

We were delighted to attend the launch of CONNECT at Telethon Kids Institute this evening.

We heard from Anne McKenzie about her vision for consumer engagement and the CONNECT program. Prof Jonathan Carapetis Executive Director explained he knew from the start how essential it is to partner with consumers. Prof Fiona Stanley shared her extensive experience connecting with consumers and how she began a SANDS group in her lounge room.

Catherine Hughes shared a consumer perspective, her story and the mutual benefit she has gained by being involved with Telethon Kids. Cath was the first to join CONNECT and sign the member agreement.

Closely followed by our Cofounder Amber. Amber contributes to Telethon Kids as Chair of the Preterm Consumer Reference Group, on the Steering Committee for the Wal-yan Respiratory Centre and in other working groups ensuring the views of the preterm community are heard. She works closely with Co-Head of the Children’s Lung Health Team Dr Shannon Simpson, pictured.

We wish to congratulate Telethon Kids on the launch of this truly incredible program and we encourage everyone interested in research to sign up. They are to be commended for their efforts to engage consumers, listen deeply and change the future so we can all raise happy, healthy kids!