Amy Lawson

Professional and consumer perspectives on allied health & osteopathy in falls prevention

B.Sc. UniMelb, B.Sc. VicMelb, MHthSci VicMelb, GradCert TertEd VicMelb

Amy is an osteopath, lecturer and RMIT University PhD candidate. Informed by her clinical work with older adults, her research explores the roles of allied health in falls prevention for community-dwelling older adults, with a focus on interprofessional collaborative care.

Amy is also a lecturer in the Osteopathy program at Victoria University, where she promotes safe, equitable care of older adults and interprofessional education to improve practitioner and patient outcomes.

Angela Young

Building a data-Informed osteopathic profession: A national PROMs pilot in NZ

M.Ost (Hons)

Angela (Anj) Young is an osteopath, clinical director of Top Notch Bodyworks in West Auckland, and currently serves in a governance leadership role at Osteopaths New Zealand. With a background in human biology and a Master of Osteopathy (Hons), Anj brings over 15 years of clinical experience to her work supporting people with musculoskeletal pain and injury.

Alongside clinical practice, she has a strong interest in strengthening the osteopathic profession through leadership, education, and research engagement. Anj has been involved in developing research mentorship pathways and supporting collaborations that connect clinicians with meaningful, practice-based research.

Anj's work focuses on bridging the gap between research, clinical practice, and professional leadership so that osteopaths are better supported to deliver high-quality, evidence-informed care. Anj is particularly interested in how hands-on therapies influence pain, recovery, and whole-person health within real-world clinical settings.

Julie Hjorth

Cost-effectiveness model of osteopathic manipulative treatment of perinatal back pain

BAppSci (Comp Med), MOst, GradDipPH, MHEcon

Julie is an osteopath based in Melbourne, Australia. She works at Ferguson St Osteopathy, a community-focused clinic providing care across paediatric, perinatal, chronic pain and LGBTIQA+ health. Julie has been a clinical supervisor and lecturer in the osteopathy program at RMIT University for over a decade, contributing to teaching in primary healthcare, clinical practice and advanced technique.

Julie holds a Master of Health Economics from Deakin University and a Graduate Diploma of Public Health from Curtin University. Her research focuses on the economic evaluation of allied health care, with a particular interest in capturing broader societal costs and outcomes, such as workforce participation, functional capacity and quality of life within analyses of healthcare value. Her current project models the cost-effectiveness of osteopathic care for perinatal back and pelvic girdle pain from a societal perspective.

Alongside clinical and academic work, Julie contributes to health system improvement through board and advisory roles in community and refugee health organisations, with a focus on equity and access to care.

Kaspara Chaise

What does treating migraine osteopathically mean in practice? A qualitative model

B.App. Sci., M. Ost

Kaspara Chaise is a French New-Zealand based osteopath who graduated from Unitec in 2016. He is passionate about research and the integration of contemporary pain science in osteopathic care. Ever since his student days, Kaspara has pursued an interest in complex pain conditions and completed his Master's thesis on the topic of migraine.

Kaspara now works in a multidisciplinary practice in the Bay of Plenty, running a persistent pain clinic. His approach focuses on using modalities like Graded Motor Imagery and sensorimotor retraining in combination with osteopathy to help patients with pain on the nociplastic spectrum.

Kylie Spencer

Belonging:  How personality and motivation shape first-year learning choices

Kylie Spencer is a lecturer and Program Manager for Osteopathy at RMIT University with a strong teaching and research focus on student learning, motivation, and belonging within health education. With extensive experience across clinical education, curriculum design, and interprofessional learning, Kylie has been a key contributor to innovative hybrid teaching models in the osteopathic program. Her work explores how student personality traits and motivational drivers influence engagement and success in blended and practice based learning environments.

Kylie is an active member of several university working groups, including those centred on assessment, psychosocial wellbeing, and embedding Indigenous perspectives in curriculum. She is passionate about equitable learning environments and has led initiatives supporting student progression, professional identity formation, and pathways across the health sciences. Kylie’s current research examines how hybrid pedagogies can better support diverse learners, enhance academic confidence, and strengthen connection to both peers and the profession.

Michael Fleischmann PhD

Patient-centred osteopathic management of non-specific neck pain: A mixed-methods case series

Lecturer, Osteopathy
Research Fellow - Institute for Health and Sport, Victoria University
College of Sport, Health and Engineering (CoSHE)

Dr Michael Fleischmann PhD is an osteopath, Lecturer in Osteopathy, and Research Fellow at Victoria University in Melbourne, Australia. His academic and research work focuses on clinical reasoning, evidence-based practice, manual therapy, contextual factors in healthcare, and musculoskeletal health. He has contributed to a range of teaching, curriculum, and research initiatives across osteopathy and health professions education, with a strong interest in translating evidence into meaningful clinical and educational practice. Michael is committed to strengthening research-informed, person-centred care and fostering critical inquiry in the next generation of health professionals.

Nicholas Tripodi

Contextual effects in osteopathy: From theory to implementation

Nicholas is a senior lecturer, research fellow and co-course chair of the osteopathy program at Victoria University, as well as the co-lead of the Pain, Movement and NeuroRehabilitation (PMNR) Research Group. He is also an adjunct fellow at the Centre for Osteopathic Research and Leadership (CORaL) at Health Sciences University in the UK.

Nicholas' research sits at the intersection of health research and education and seeks to improve not only how we best deliver clinical care, but how do we train and prepare the health workforce of the future. His research spans several methodologies from pragmatic clinical trials, to qualitative studies investigating lived experiences.   

Roger Engel PhD

Hospital-based clinical research: The Australian osteopathic experience

PhD, DO, DC, BSc(Hons)

Roger Engel is an osteopath with over 40 years’ experience in clinical practice and research in Australia, the US and Indonesia. He currently holds appointments as Adjunct Associate Professor in the Faculty of Health at Southern Cross University and Honorary Senior Research Fellow in the Faculty of Medicine, Health and Human Sciences at Macquarie University.

Roger is a clinician scientist who has been involved in clinical research for the past 25 years. His research interests cover several fields including the non-pharmacological management of chronic respiratory disease, paediatric and maternal care, and more recently post-concussion syndrome. He has authored over 75 papers in peer-reviewed journals and supervises PhD and Master of Research students.

Tim McNamara

Worried about what happens if someone makes a complaint about you?

Tim has over ten years of experience as a clinical osteopath in private clinics having graduated from a Master of Health Science (Osteopathy) from Victoria University in 2012. He has further qualifications in tertiary education and is currently undertaking a PhD in the field of obstetrics. Tim’s research also focusses on allied health practice and the osteopathic workforce in Australia.

Tim is currently a lecturer at RMIT University, and he now has over five years’ experience working in health regulation. Tim is the current deputy chair of the board, he is also the current chair of the osteopathic registration and notifications committee, and sits on the multi profession immediate action committee.