The information contained within the Mental Health Care in the Emergency Department: Learning from Lived Experience online resource is grounded on qualitative research conducted by RMIT University based researchers in collaboration with the Australasian College of Emergency Medicine (ACEM), St Vincent’s Hospital, Melbourne, and Mind Australia. Funding for the project was provided by RMIT University’s Enabling Capability Platforms Opportunity Fund.
Research Team
The multidisciplinary research project informing the development of mental health education resources for Emergency Department (ED) staff was led by Professor Renata Kokanović in collaboration with Professor Stuart Thomas, Dr Nicholas Hill, Associate Professor Cameron Duff, Mx Rory Randall and Dr Chris Maylea. The development of the educational content was further supported by Dr Natalie Hendry and Dr Ruth De Souza and produced in collaboration Mr Chad O’Brien, Digital Media Producer.
Partner investigators
Thank you to our partner investigators Ms Nicola Ballenden, Executive Director Research, Advocacy and Policy Development, Mind Australia, formerly ACEM (Executive Director, Policy and Strategic Partnerships), Dr Sarah Pollock, Chief Mental Health Advocate for Western Australia, formerly Mind Australia (Executive Director Research and Advocacy Research & Advocacy), and Professor David Castle, inaugural Scientific Director, Centre for Complex Interventions at The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Canada, formerly St Vincent’s Hospital Melbourne (Professor of Psychiatry). We would also like to thank Dr Andrew Walby, Director of St Vincent's Emergency Department and Dr Claire Skinner, president elect, ACEM, for supporting this project.
Acknowledgements
A special thank you must go the seventeen people who shared their experiences of attending an ED with a mental health related concern. The resources presented on this site have been developed based on their accounts of the mental healthcare received with ED settings.
The research team would like to thank Ms Indigo Daya and Ms Rebecca Egan for their contribution to earlier stages of the project.
We would also like to thank the lived experience working group who assisted in developing the framework for our approach to the production of the mental health education and training resources.
Thanks must also go to Professor Simon Craig, Monash Medical Centre (Paediatric Emergency Physician) and Department of Paediatrics, Monash University (Adjunct Clinical Professor), and Professor Daniel Fatovich, Eastern Mental Health Service, Perth (Director of Research) for their support and contribution to the project.
Thank you to Dr Kate Johnston-AtaAta for her assistance and guidance in the development of the Healthtalk Australia website and summaries accompanying the mental health education and training resources.
Finally, we would like to thank RMIT’s Enabling Capability Platform Opportunity Fund for supporting this project and development of the accompanying online resource.