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Leda’s Research Higher Degree dissertation is titled ‘First Australian Holistic Health: Development of a Multi-Dimensional Model of Suicidal Ideation and Suicide-Related Behaviour’ - an investigation of the lived experience of suicidality amongst First Australians in the Mackay community. Leda’s dissertation will continually inform the practice of individuals participating in the improvement of another’s wellbeing by providing a First Australian model of holistic health.

Leda is a registered Psychologist and a member of both the Australian Indigenous Psychologists Association (AIPA) and Indigenous Allied Health Australia (IAHA). Leda’s research and counselling psychology experience includes working in urban, regional and rural regions, including First Australian communities. Leda has many years of experience in the health sector and has published on Indigenous ways of knowing, Indigenous women with disabilities, chronic disease management and suicide in First Australian communities.

Professor Elizabeth Kendall completed her PhD in 1997 on the topic of adjustment following traumatic injury, for which she won the Dean’s Commendation for Outstanding PhD Thesis in 1998 (UQ). She has continued to build a research agenda in rehabilitation and service systems for people who are managing the consequences of serious disabilities or chronic conditions. She has designed and directed complex community-based evaluations and randomized controlled trials of major health reform projects over the last decade, including the Ambulatory Care demonstration projects the Queensland Self-Management Alliance, the Chronic Disease Place-based Initiative and the Logan-Beaudesert Health Coalition, the Qld Health Self-Management Alliance, the Coordinated Care Trials, the Sharing Healthcare demonstration project, the Community Rehabilitation Workforce Reform Project, the Chronic Disease Smart State Working Party, the Spinal Injury Response Project and the Youngcare Alternative Service Model trial. She was instrumental in the formation of Headway Queensland in 1984 (now known as Synapse), the Riding for Disabled Association, the Acquired Brain Injury Outreach Service and the STePS program across Queensland. She was a founding partner of the Centre for Functioning and Health within Metro South HHS.

Elizabeth has run a collaborative research program for the last 25 years with several significant partners including Queensland Health, the Motor Accident Insurance Commission, Synapse, Spinal Life Australia and Health Consumers Queensland. The Hopkins Centre was officially formed from this collaborative in 2017 and Elizabeth is the Executive Director. The centre brings together over 150 researchers, policy-makers and practitioners and consumers to solve complex problems in rehabilitation. Elizabeth has attracted over $50 million in research grants and consultancies, including 9 large Australian Research Council grants. She has over 200 publications in high quality journals such as Social Science and Medicine, American Journal of Public Health, Rehabilitation Psychology, Disability and Rehabilitation and has produced over 65 industry reports. She was chair of the ARC College of Experts in 2009-2011 and continues to review grants in ARC and NHMRC as well as international funding schemes.

Click here to view research publications on Google Scholar

Click here to view research profile, outputs and collaborations on Griffith Experts