Presenter: Professor Elizabeth Waters

Synopsis:There is a strong linear relationship between disadvantage and child health, education and social outcomes, with a vast body of literature describing problems, associations and experiences. Evidence of the solutions is often greater than you expect, but less relevant than you hope. This presentation will provide an overview of the Jack Brockhoff Child Health and Wellbeing Program, and highlight the longitudinal evolution and compilation of the evidence for childhood obesity prevention (initiated at RCH in 1995), as well as new studies related to child mental health, oral health, and children in same sex families.

Speakers:

Elizabeth Waters is the Jack Brockhoff Chair of Child Public Health at the University of Melbourne. She started her child health research work at the Centre for Community Child Health in 1994, before leaving for Oxford to do her DPhil on the Health of Young Victorians Study. She returned from Oxford with the responsibility for the Cochrane Public Health Group, which has been generously supported by VicHealth and NHMRC since 2000. The Jack Brockhoff Child Health and Wellbeing Program located within the University of Melbourne comprises a program of evidence generation that aims to make a difference to child health inequalities integrated with a strong international knowledge translation research and evidence synthesis program