Special Interest Group - Health Preference Research

This SIG focuses on understanding preferences of key stakeholders, including patients, clinicians and decision-makers using choice experiment methodology.

The SIG will:

  • Disseminate new methodology in the field
  • Meet 2-times a year to:
    • Provide training in health preference research methods
    • Provide mentoring opportunities for HDR/ECRs

To deliver the aims and objectives, the SIG will:

  • Create a Microsoft Teams Group – to act as an online forum to discuss methodology and converse with each other
  • Create an online newsletter for dissemination of relevant research- The SIG will scope new research papers and disseminate them through a newsletter
  • Organise ‘preference methods training’
    • Suggested structure: 1-hour organised sessions (30-minutes of teaching & 30-minutes for Q&A))
  • Organise mentoring sessions
  • Organise an online HDR/ECR conference/workshop

Note: exact dates of proposed activities will be determined following a survey that will go out to members

If you would like to join the SIG, please contact the conveners:

Sanjeewa Kularatna at sanjeewa.kularatna@qut.edu.au

Yuanyuan Gu at yuanyuan.gu@mq.edu.au

Thao Thai at thao.thai@monash.edu

Conveners

Sanjeewa Kularatna
Sanjeewa Kularatna
Queensland University of Technology (QUT)

A/ Prof. Kularatna is a health services researcher and a health economist with special interest in evaluating heart disease related interventions and the preferences of health consumers. He has been a chief investigator on more than 33 grants (worth over $23 million) including highly competitive funding from the NHMRC, MRFF and Digital Health CRC. He is a principal research fellow at the Australian Centre for Health Services Innovation (AusHSI) and Centre for Healthcare Transformation (CHT) at Queensland University of Technology. He holds a leadership role at the School of Public Health and Social Work as Academic Lead, Post Graduate Research and oversees ~ 90 PhD projects. He has published over 90 peer-reviewed manuscripts and one book chapter, and has led seven consultancy projects, including a review of the $30 million Integrated Care Innovation Fund projects from Queensland Health, commercial consultancies from primary health networks and the Department of Veterinary Affairs. He has been appointed Fellow of Cardiovascular Society Australia New Zealand (FCSANZ) due to his commitment to heart related health services research.

Yuanyuan Gu
Yuanyuan Gu
Centre for the Health Economy, Macquarie University (MUCHE)

Yuanyuan Gu is a Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for the Health Economy at Macquarie University (MUCHE).

His research is in the broad area of health economics, economics of ageing and aged care, choice modelling and econometrics, with a particular interest in preferences, choice, behaviour, and performance in the health and aged care system. His research has been published in leading journals such as Journal of Health Economics, Health Economics, and Social Science & Medicine. He has been a Chief Investigator or Associate Investigator on over A$14 million in external funding including a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship.

He is a senior leader within the health policy team and leads the health preference (choice modelling) research stream at MUCHE. He is also a senior advisor for the health technology assessment team and a member of the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee (PBAC) evaluation team.

He is an editorial board member of PharmacoEconomics and Journal of Hospital Management and Health Policy, a member of Australian Health Economics Society and International Academy of Health Preference Research, and a founding member of the Chinese health preference research network.

Thao Thai
Thao Thai
SPHPM,
Monash University

Thao Thai is a Research Fellow at the Health Economics Division in the School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, at Monash University.

Her research interests fall into three main areas: (1) Health preferences involving the use of stated preference methods such as discrete choice experiments, (2) Outcome measurement including qualitative and quantitative research on the psychometric performance of health-related quality of life instruments, and (3) Economic evaluations and burden of disease. She is currently working on the Indigenous Youth Mental Health project with a focus on outcome measurement in economic evaluations of mental healthcare in Indigenous settings.

She is a member of the Australian Health Economics Society and the International Academy of Health Preference Research.