News media are highly influential in setting health agendas and shaping health policy. The program builds multidisciplinary research capacity between 3 universities, including participation by some of Australia’s leading health journalists, to examine the content and accuracy of news treatments of health issues, how key audiences understand and are influenced by news coverage, how journalists decide which issues to cover and how they approach this coverage. The program aims to improve media lite ....News media are highly influential in setting health agendas and shaping health policy. The program builds multidisciplinary research capacity between 3 universities, including participation by some of Australia’s leading health journalists, to examine the content and accuracy of news treatments of health issues, how key audiences understand and are influenced by news coverage, how journalists decide which issues to cover and how they approach this coverage. The program aims to improve media literacy and the potency of policy advocacy among health professionals and so improve the quality of health news reporting in Australia.Read moreRead less
The Blood Pressure Lowering Treatment Trialists' Collaboration
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$166,250.00
Summary
Treatments that lower blood pressure are well known to reduce the risk of heart attack and stroke, and several different classes of blood pressure lowering drug are now widely used. While all the main classes of drug offer protection against serious complications, it is possible that one drug class may be better than the others. However, whether this is so remains uncertain and cannot be reliably determined by any one single study. The Blood Pressure Lowering Treatment Trialists' Collaboration i ....Treatments that lower blood pressure are well known to reduce the risk of heart attack and stroke, and several different classes of blood pressure lowering drug are now widely used. While all the main classes of drug offer protection against serious complications, it is possible that one drug class may be better than the others. However, whether this is so remains uncertain and cannot be reliably determined by any one single study. The Blood Pressure Lowering Treatment Trialists' Collaboration is a large international project led by a group of Australian researchers based at the Institute for International Health in Sydney. The aim of the project is to systematically gather together sufficient information from large-scale studies to make it possible to answer important outstanding questions about the effects of different classes of blood pressure lowering drugs on major outcomes, such as heart attack and stroke. The Collaboration includes many of the leading blood pressure researchers from around the world and will combine data from more than 30 trials and over 200,000 individuals. On the basis of the overview results it should be possible to provide doctors with important new information about the best blood pressure lowering treatment for their patients. A previous review of the effects of blood pressure drugs completed by the same group was published in The Lancet in 2000, and has been an important aid to many professional and regulatory groups in the year since. Reliable information about the effects of different classes of blood pressure lowering drugs is of great importance. Even if differences between the effects of different classes of drug are small, the implications for the prevention of blood pressure-related complications would be substantial because of the very large numbers of people taking them, worldwide. This collaborative overview project offers a unique opportunity to provide the most reliable and up-to-date information on the subject.Read moreRead less
This study will provide highly reliable information about the use of tight blood glucose control in critically ill patients. It involves an international collaboration between opinion leaders in this field and uses sophisticated statistical methods to combine data from all the clinical trials in this area. The study will clarify many of the current clinical questions about tight glucose control during critical illness, informing practice guidelines in Australia and around the world.
Blood Pressure Lowering In Patients With Chronic Kidney Disease: Evidence From Prospectively Planned Overview Analyses
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$257,271.00
Summary
This study will provide highly reliable information about the best way of managing blood pressure in people with chronic kidney disease. It will use sophisticated methods to summarize information from 25 large clinical trials and 160,000 participants to determine whether lowering blood pressure reduces the risk of heart disease and further kidney damage.The study will also determine whether currently recommended blood pressure drugs are those which will provide the most benefit.
Functional Characterisation Of Pendrin: The Anion Transporter Causing Pendred Syndrome
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$211,527.00
Summary
Mutations in the human pendrin protein cause progressive hearing loss from an early age in Pendred syndrome. Using techniques of molecular and cellular biology, we intend to test the effects of Pendred-causing mutations on the function of pendrin expressed in frog and cultured mammalian cells. Our approach will enable us to determine how pendrin functions in both the normal and diseased states, which is currently unknown. This will allow us to consider ways of correcting the ion channel defect a ....Mutations in the human pendrin protein cause progressive hearing loss from an early age in Pendred syndrome. Using techniques of molecular and cellular biology, we intend to test the effects of Pendred-causing mutations on the function of pendrin expressed in frog and cultured mammalian cells. Our approach will enable us to determine how pendrin functions in both the normal and diseased states, which is currently unknown. This will allow us to consider ways of correcting the ion channel defect associated with the Pendred syndrome.Read moreRead less