Fellowship ​

The Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences elects the best and brightest minds in the field of medical and health sciences as Fellows.

Fellows are elected in recognition of their outstanding achievements and exceptional contributions to the sector. The Fellowship are acknowledged for their clinical, non-clinical, leadership, industry and research contributions.

Find Fellows of the AAHMS

To find Fellows of our Academy either use the search form below or download the full list of current Fellows here.

Name

Position

Level

Elected

State

Head, Cancer Research Program, School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine
Monash University
2015
VIC

Professor Zalcberg has made a significant contribution to improving cancer control in Australia. He has been involved in a broad range of activities that include the growth of the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre into a centre of excellence nationally to supporting clinical trials, both as a clinician within the Australasian Gastro-intestinal Trials Group as well as in the development of processes that support all trials groups. He is highly regarded both nationally and internationally as a leader in his field and continues to play an active role in endeavours that aim to improve the quality of health care in Australia.

Director, Burn Service of Western Australia / Director, Burn Injury Research Unit
The University of Western Australia
2015
WA

Winthrop Professor Fiona Wood is a Plastic & Reconstructive Surgeon specialising in the field of burn care, trauma and scar reconstruction. As Director of the WA Burns Service of Western Australia she is consultant at Princess Margaret Hospital for Children and Fiona Stanley Hospital.

As director of burns research, she leads an interdisciplinary team with broad collaboration focused on translation to improve clinical outcomes. She has been the recipient of the 2003 Australian Medical Association ‘Contribution to Medicine’ Award and an Order of Australia Medal for work with Bali bombing victims. As a National Living Treasure and Australian Citizen of the Year in 2004. she received the honour of being named Australian of the Year in 2005.

Fiona and Marie Stoner, co-founders of Clinical Cell Culture, now Avitamedical, won the 2005 Clunies Ross Award for their contributions to Medical Science in Australia.

Executive Director
South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute (SAHMRI)
2014
SA

Professor Steve  Wesselingh is an Infectious Diseases Physician and researcher in Neurovirology, HIV and vaccine development.

Professor Wesselingh took up the position as the inaugural Executive Director of the South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute (SAHMRI) in October 2011. Professor Wesselingh has also been appointed as the Infection and Immunity Theme Leader for the institute.

Professor Wesselingh was Dean of the Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences at Monash University, from 2007-2011. Prior to taking up the Deanship, he was Director of the Burnet Institute an independent medical research institute specialises in infectious diseases, immunology and public health.

Professor Wesselingh undertook his undergraduate and doctoral training at Flinders University/Flinders Medical Centre in South Australia and his post-doctoral training at Johns Hopkins in the United States. In 2012, Professor Wesselingh joined a list of 566 people inducted into the prestigious Johns Hopkins Society of Scholars.

Professor Wesselingh has consistently worked towards the integration of high quality medical research with health-care delivery, leading to improved health outcomes for Australia and the poorly resourced countries of the region.

Senior Staff Specialist in Intensive Care
Royal Perth Hospital, The University of Western Australia
2014
WA

Professor Steve Webb graduated from medicine at the University of Western Australia in 1987 and trained as an adult intensive care physician with the Royal Australasian College of Physicians. His research training comprises a PhD from Imperial College and a Masters of Public Health from the University of Western Australia. He has been an ICU specialist at Royal Perth Hospital since 2001 where he continues to have substantial clinical commitments caring for patients who are critically ill. He holds adjunct professorial appointments at the University of Western Australia, Monash University, and the George Institute for Global Health.

His major research interests relate to the causes and management of various forms of immediately life-threatening illness and include influenza and pneumonia, long-term outcomes after critical illness, resuscitation of patients with septic shock, management of traumatic brain injury, pathogenesis of septic shock, antimicrobial therapy, blood transfusion, sedation practices, rehabilitation and mobilisation, choice of intravenous resuscitation fluids, and the delivery and evaluation of healthcare services. As a trialist he has randomised more than 20,000 patients and the results of those trials have regularly changed clinical practice and healthcare policy. He led time-critical observational studies that were pivotal in establishing the severity of the 2009 influenza A H1N1 pandemic.

Professor Webb has also played a major leadership role in research policy and management, in Australia and globally, having been a rotating chair of the Australian and New Zealand Intensive Care Society Clinical Trials group, by his role in the establishment of the Australian Clinical Trials Alliance, and by his contribution to the establishment of the International Severe Acute Respiratory and Emerging Infection Consortium.

Professor and Head of Surgery
Flinders University
2015
SA

Professor David Watson is head of Surgery at Flinders University. He leads a multidisciplinary research group which is addressing oesophageal disease, has 317 publications, and received $21,518,189 in research funding. He pioneered the development of laparoscopic surgery and conducted 15 randomized trials, generating the world’s largest contribution to evidence supporting surgery for gastro-oesophageal reflux. He is now addressing oesophageal cancer by leading a multistate consortium. Professor Watson’s has led national and international organisations. He is Secretary of the International Society for Diseases of the Esophagus. He led the establishment of the Australia and New Zealand Gastric & Oesophageal Surgery Association and served as President until 2011. In 2003 he was awarded the John Mitchell Crouch Fellowship, the highest research award from the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons. In 2006 he received a prestigious James IV Travelling Fellowship. Internationally, he is leading Flinders University’s engagement with China with the establishment of a Cancer Genetics research laboratory in China.

About Fellowship with AAHMS

Our Fellows sit at the heart of everything we do. They represent Australia’s leading minds in health and medical sciences, having been recognised for their clinical, non-clinical, leadership, industry and research contributions.

To be considered for election to the Academy’s Fellowship, a candidate must show exceptional professional achievement in a field related to health and/or medicine.

Fellows contribute to the projects and activities of the Academy and must be willing to be active participants.

Successful Fellowship candidates will have shown:

  • Outstanding leadership in their field.
  • Significant and ongoing involvement with issues of health care, prevention of disease, education, research, and health services policy and delivery.

Candidates for Fellowship should meet the following criteria:

  • National and International recognition for excellence in health and medical science
  • Significant, sustained and ongoing contributions to advance health and medical science in Australia (relative to opportunity)
  • Contribution to the profession through leadership and mentorship
  • Raised public understanding and promoting health and medical science in the broader community

Download criteria for Fellowship

Each year, current Fellows of the Academy are invited to nominate up to four new candidates who meet the criteria and fulfil the required expectations.

To ensure the Academy has a representative and diverse membership, Fellows nominating two new candidates are asked to include only a maximum of one man, and Fellows nominating four new candidates are asked to include only a maximum of two men.

How to make a nomination

Fellows wishing to nominate a candidate for Fellowship should contact the secretariat by 24 November each year to confirm candidate eligibility and receive and instructions on how to submit the completed nomination documentation online. Nomination requests received past this deadline will not be considered in the current election round.

Fellows wishing to nominate a candidate for a Corresponding Fellowship should contact the secretariat for more information.

Secretariat contact details
Email: [email protected]

Phone: 07 3102 7220

Nomination guidelines for ordinary Fellowship

October 2023
Newly elected Fellows of 2023 are inducted at the Annual Meeting.

18 September 2023- 30 November 2023
Nominations are invited from existing Fellows until the closing date of 30 November.

December 2023
Nominations allocated to Selection Committees.

January – April 2024
Referees’ reports sought.

Early May 2024
Selection Committees meet to consider nominations and provide final recommendations to the Council.

Early-to-mid-July 2024
Council meets to finalise recommendations.

Late July 2024
Full Fellowship invited to comment on recommended new fellows.

August 2024
Election results are shared with proposers and candidates (under embargo).

October 2024
Newly elected Fellows of 2024 inducted at the Annual Meeting.

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