PROGRAM

View Program Timetable

Keynote Presenters

Professor Annette Dobson
Professor of Biostatistics in the School of Population Health, University of Queensland, Director, Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health

Associate Professor Matthew Knuiman
School of Population Health, University of Western Australia

Professor John Hopper
NHMRC Senior Principal Research Fellow and Professorial Fellow Director, Centre for Genetic Epidemiology and Australian NHMRC Twin, Chief Investigator, Australian Breast Cancer Family Study, The University of Melbourne, Centre for Genetic Epidemiology

Professor Julie Byles
Director, Centre for Research and Education in Ageing, Faculty of Health, University of Newcastle

Program Information

Key Topics for Papers and Posters
Preference will be given to papers and posters related to the conference theme, 'Looking ahead in epidemiology'. Fortunately, this theme is very broad and should accommodate most papers. All abstracts will be peer-reviewed by the scientific committee. Presenters will be notified by 22^nd July 2005. All accepted paper and poster abstracts will be included in the Annual Scientific Meeting edition of the Australasian Epidemiologist.

Presentation Options
Presenters have two options for their presentations: oral paper presentation or poster display. Please indicate your preference for the above presentation options. As the number of oral paper presentations is limited, preference will be given to the highest quality papers as judged by the scientific committee.

Oral Presentations
Papers will be allocated a total of 15 minutes. This will include a maximum of 10 minutes for the presentation and 5 minutes for questions.

Poster Displays
Posters will be displayed for the duration of the Annual Scientific Meeting and will have a dedicated session when presenters will remain with their posters. Presenters will set-up their posters by the morning tea break of the first day of the Annual Scientific Meeting. Posters should be no more than 1 metre by 1 metre in dimension.

Submission of Abstracts
Abstracts must be received by Wednesday, 1^st June 2005. Due to printing and publishing deadlines, no late abstracts can be accepted. Please indicate if you are a student when submitting your abstract to be eligible to receive one of the three student travel bursaries of A$500 each.

The following are the themes for abstract submission:

Epidemiological methods

Occupational health, safety and injury

Cancer

Communicable/infectious diseases

Chronic disease

Indigenous health

Health services research

Healthy ageing

Reproductive, maternal and child health

Other

If the abstract fits none of the themes please indicate 'other'. This will not disadvantage your abstract from being selected.

Student Presentation

As part of AEA's commitment to its student members and following the success of recent student presentations at previous meetings, student presentations continue to be held as part of the AEA Annual Scientific Meeting.

The aim of these presentations is to provide post-graduate epidemiology students with the opportunity to meet other students and to discuss methodological issues with experienced epidemiologists. We encourage all post-graduate students to attend and to consider whether you have some issue you could present. It will be a great opportunity to meet other students in similar situations and to participate in high level methodological discussions. While designed for post-graduate epidemiology student presentations, the session has shown itself to be popular with non-student and student delegates at past Annual Scientific Meetings. In 2005 the student workshop will be offered as a plenary session, to allow all delegates the opportunity to attend.

The session will revolve around the presenting students, who will present a methodological problem they have encountered in their research. Each student will be matched with one or two epidemiologists with expertise in their area, who will lead a discussion involving the presenting student and the audience. Each of the presenting students will be expected to provide a brief background, outline the problem and state the objectives of the session. This will be followed by time for the discussant(s) to speak and then a general discussion involving the audience.

Abstracts are invited for the annual student presentation, part of the AEA Annual Scientific Meeting. Abstracts must be received by Wednesday, 1^st June 2005. Due to printing and publishing deadlines, no late abstracts can be accepted.

Full details and application guidelines are available on the AEA website and on the Abstract Submission page of this Annual Scientific Meeting website.

Enquiries can be directed to the AEA student representative, Yin Paradies

Longitudinal Studies Workshop: The Practicalities

Registration Deadline for the Workshop is 20^th September 2005

Date: Wednesday, 5^th October 2005

Venue: Noah's on the Beach, Newcastle

The workshop will be run by staff from the Research Centre for Gender and Health who have been conducting the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health since its inception in 1995. While emphasis will be given to issues of interest to participants, the main areas addressed in the workshop will be planning, recruitment and retention, data management and statistical issues. These areas are likely to include budgets, staffing, survey design and piloting, mailing and printing, participant contact, consent, linkage, data cleaning, capture and storage, representativeness, sample size calculations and reporting results.

PRELIMINARY PROGRAM

08:00: Registration and arrival coffee

____________________________________

08:30: Welcome and Introduction
Emeritus Professor Lois Bryson, Director, RCGH

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08:45: Proposing a longitudinal study

Research proposal and initial funding of the ALSWH.
Emeritus Professor Lois Bryson, Director, RCGH

____________________________________

09:00: Planning

Planning and starting a longitudinal study.
Dr Penny Warner-Smith, Deputy Director, RCGH

Record keeping and communication strategies.
Ms Rosie Mooney, Research Assistant, RCGH

Survey Design.
Dr Deborah Loxton, Research Manager, RCGH

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10:30: Morning tea

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11:00: Participant contact

Recruitment.
Lyn Adamson, Research Assistant, RCGH

Retention and relationships.
Catherine Chojenta, Research Assistant, RCGH

Consent and record linkage.
Dr Anne Young, Project Statistician, RCGH

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12:30: Lunch

____________________________________

13:30: Data management

Data quality.
Jean Ball, Data Manager, RCGH

Data documentation.
Eliza Fraser, Research Assistant, ALSWH

Data maintenance - matching against the National Death Index.
Anna Graves, Assistant Data Manager, RCGH

____________________________________

15:00: Afternoon tea

____________________________________

15:30: Statistical issues for longitudinal studies

Representativeness, attrition and generalisability.
Jennifer Powers, Statistician, RCGH

Sample size calculations.
Dr Virginia Wheway, Statistician, RCGH

Reporting results.
Dr Anne Young, Project Statistician, RCGH

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17:00: Closing remarks
Professor Annette Dobson, Project Director, ALSWH

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Program is subject to change

Delegates may register for the Longitudinal Studies Workshop only or may register for the Annual Scientific Meeting as well as the Longitudinal Studies Workshop. REGISTER NOW

Registration Fees for Longitudinal Studies Workshop: The Practicalities
Annual Scientific Meeting Full Delegate (attending both ASM and Longitudinal Studies Workshop): $150.00
Non-Annual Scientific Meeting Delegate (attending Longitudinal Studies Workshop only): $250.00

For further information please visit http://www.newcastle.edu.au/centre/wha and http://www.newcastle.edu.au/centre/rcgh

Preliminary Annual Scientific Meeting Program

Wednesday, 5^th October 2005

17:30 - 19:30: Pre-registration

17:30 - 19:30: Welcome Reception

Thursday, 6^th October 2005

08:00 - 17:30: Registration open

08:00 - 08:30: Registration and arrival coffee

08:30 - 09:00: Welcome and Opening Remarks

08:30 - 10:30: Plenary session 1
Professor Annette Dobson
Associate Professor Matthew Knuiman

10:30 - 11:00: Morning Tea Break

11:00 - 12:30: Free paper session 1

12:30 - 13:30: Lunch

13:30 - 15:00: Free paper session 2

15:00 - 15:30: Afternoon Tea Break

15:30 - 16:30: Workshops

16:30 - 17:30: Poster presentations - viewing with wine and cheese

17:30 - 18:30: AEA Annual General Meeting

19:00 - 23:00: Annual Scientific Meeting Dinner - Harbourview Restaurant

Friday, 7^th October 2005

08:30 - 17:00: Registration open

08:30 - 09:00: Registration and arrival coffee

09.00 - 10.30: Plenary session 2
Ian Prior Oration: Professor Julie Byles
Professor John Hopper

10:30 - 11:00: Morning Tea Break

11:00 - 12:30: Student presentation session

12:30 - 13:30: Lunch

13:30 - 15:00: Free paper session 3

15:00 - 15:30: Afternoon Tea Break

15:30 - 16:30: Free paper session 4

16:30 - 17:00: Awards Presentation and Annual Meeting Close

Program is subject to change

Registration at the Annual Meeting

The Annual Meeting registration desk will be staffed during the following times:

Wednesday, 5^th October 2005 17:30 - 19:30

Thursday, 6^th October 2005 08:00 - 17:30

Friday, 7^th October 2005 08:00 - 17:00

Professor Annette Dobson

Annette Dobson is the Professor of Biostatistics in the School of Population Health at the University of Queensland. She is also the Director of the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health. From 1983 to 1994 she was the Principal Investigator for the Newcastle (Australia) collaborating centre of the World Health Organization's MONICA Project - the largest ever epidemiological study of cardiovascular disease. She has published extensively on statistical modeling, cardiovascular epidemiology, smoking
prevention and women's health.

Associate Professor Matthew Knuiman

Professor Knuiman is a biostatistician/epidemiologist whose primary training was in the field of statistics. After three years in the Department of Biostatistics at Harvard University he returned to The University of Western Australia in 1988 to help establish the postgraduate program in public health. He has responsibility for biostatistics teaching and supervises a number of PhD and Master's level research projects. He was Head of Department of Public Health 1998-2002. His current research interests focus on the population and clinical epidemiology of cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and respiratory diseases. Since 1990 he has been the Biostatistician/Epidemiologist for the Busselton Health Study (BHS). He is the Chair of the BHS Research and Scientific Committee and is custodian of the BHS database. He has published 100+ peer-reviewed research articles/book chapters in the fields of biostatistics, epidemiology, public health, medicine and surgery.

Professor John Hopper

Professor John Hopper is a NHMRC Senior Principal Research Fellow and Professorial Fellow with a PhD in Mathematical Statistics. He has published more than 250 papers on the statistical methodology for analysing twin and family data, addressing the genetic and environmental causes of variation in health-related characteristics, and their applications. Applications include blood lead levels, bone density, mammographic density, blood pressure and other cardiovascular risk factors. He is Director of the Centre for Molecular, Environmental, Genetic and Analytic Epidemiology in the Department of Public Health at The University of Melbourne. He is principal or co-investigator on a number of family studies across a range of diseases and conditions, particularly breast cancer and colorectal cancer (both funded by the National Institutes of Health (USA)), prostate cancer, melanoma, childhood cancer and asthma. He is a co-investigator on several cohort studies of middle-aged men and women, including Health 2000. Professor Hopper has been Director of the Australian Twin Registry since 1990.

Professor Julie Byles

Professor Julie Byles is Director of the Centre for Research and Education I Ageing in the Faculty Health at the University of Newcastle. Professor Byles' research interests in ageing include the role of health services in maintaining quality of life for older people, and in determining physical, psychological and social factors associated with 'positive ageing'. Professor Byles is an investigator on the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health; her main interest is in the oldest cohort, which involves around 10,000 women who were aged 70 to 75 years at baseline in 1996. She was also the lead investigator on the Department of Veterans' Affairs' Preventive Care Trial - a ten-centre randomised controlled trial of the effectiveness of health assessments for older Australian veterans and war widows.