Author: Karen Teshuva

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Sandy Benjamin OAM and Norman Same join the AUSiMED Board of Directors

We are delighted to welcome two new directors who joined the AUSiMED board in December 2024.  Sandy Benjamin OAM and Norman Same.

Sandy has degrees in psychology and Social Work and practiced for seventeen years in family psychiatry and adoption. She lectured in the social work school at La Trobe University, played a leading role in the reform of adoption law in the state of Victoria, Australia, and ran a private counselling service for people with fertility problems. She has serves as Chairman and President of the Jewish Museum of Australia and was Director of the Foundation of the National Gallery of Australia from 2007 to 2017.

Norman is a director of EQ8 Accountants with a Bachelor of Economics and a Graduate Certificate in Leadership and Organisation Dynamics. He has extensive experience working with small-to-medium sized enterprises, particularly with family businesses. He is a Chartered Tax Adviser of the Taxation Institute of Australia and an affiliate of the Institute of Chartered Accountants. He is a passionate hockey player and is currently the Finance Director of World Masters Hockey.

We look forward to the invaluable contributions Sandy and Norman will bring to our organisation.

AUSiMED Celebrates 10 Year of Achievement
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AUSiMED Celebrates 10 Year of Achievement

AUSTRALIA-ISRAEL MEDICAL RESEARCH (AUSiMED) is celebrating TEN years of achievement.

AUSiMED was launched in the strong belief that Australia and Israel, two world leaders in clinical research, could, through collaborative endeavour, deliver outcomes beneficial to both countries AND the global community.

We are proud of the progress we are making, delivering on this Mission.

2022 was a particularly impactful example of the power of our cross-border model. In September 2022, AUSiMED hosted the 2nd Jerusalem International Conference on Trauma and Mental Health which delivered a powerful program covering innovative approaches to the treatment of PTSD to participants from Europe, the middle east, Australia, and North America.

In 2022 AUSiMED also facilitated the visit to Israel, of fifteen of Australia’s leading Public Health experts. Led by Professor Sharon Lewin, the Director of the Doherty Institute, the 15-person group, including the Chief Health Officers (CHO) of NSW and South Australia, the Deputy CHO of Victoria, engaged with their Israeli counterparts in a rewarding exchange of learnings from the battle with COVID-19.

What is particularly gratifying is that we were able to deliver on these major initiatives while continuing and deepening our commitment to world-leading Australia-Israel collaborative clinical research initiatives and Fellowships.

The list of AUSiMED’s achievements is long and it is continuing to grow and deepen due to the ongoing, generous support we are receiving from our donor community.

2023-24 Paediatric Kidney Disease (seeking funding for Years 2 and 3)

2023-23 Ovarian Cancer 

2022 COVID19 Public Health and Research Mission to Israel

2022 2nd International Conference on Trauma and Mental Health

2020-22 Orygen-Enosh Youth Mental Health Learning Exchange

2016-20 Goshen Project

2017-19 Stem Cell Therapy for Immune Disorders

2016-18 Dream Doctors

2018 Blood Test to Detect Glioma

2016-17 Bowel Cancer

2016-17 Triple negative breast cancer

2014-ongoing Lowy Paediatric Fellowships

2014-ongoing Israel Short Stays Program

2014 Australia-Israel Paediatric Research Symposium, Melbourne.

2022 Lewin COVID-19 Research & Public Health Delegation to Israel
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2022 Lewin COVID-19 Research & Public Health Delegation to Israel

Australia and Israel are strategic partners in trade, culture and health. In the wake of COVID-19, AUSiMED recognised an opportunity to distil and exchange the lessons learnt by Australia and Israel in their response to the pandemic. In September 2022, a high-level Delegation of Australian public health officials and expert scientists participated in a COVID[1]19 Learning Exchange Mission to Israel. The mission was organised by AUSiMED with the active support of the Israel Embassy in Canberra.

The delegation was led by Professor Sharon Lewin AO, Director of the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity and Co-Chair of the National COVID-19 Health and Research Advisory Council (NCHRAC). 

During the 5-day visit the delegation met with many of Israel’s top public health officials and practitioners to develop person-to-person networks between Australia and Israel and inform ongoing management of the COVID-19 pandemic and potentially other infectious diseases going forward.

The Lewin COVID-19 Delegation was hugely successful on a range of important dimensions while also meeting AUSiMED’s mission of enhancing global health outcomes through engagement between Australia and Israel. A number of opportunities for future collaboration were identified during and following the mission, including:

A very exciting opportunity for the Royal Flying Doctors Service to trial an Israeli device enabling one of the major barriers to use of telehealth (being the inability to physically examine the patient) to be largely overcome;

Further engagement between Australian and Israeli data modelling experts regarding systems and approaches to data linkage, machine learning, and predictive algorithms; and

Opportunities for new AUSiMED fellowships in several areas.

Introducing AUSiMED's 2022 Lowy Paediatric Fellows
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Introducing AUSiMED's 2022 Lowy Paediatric Fellows

Dr Nir Samuel (AUSiMED Fellow) with Prof Mark Fitzgerald and Dr Danny Ben-Eli (Trauma Service, Alfred Health, and NTRI)

Two Israeli paediatricians, Dr Nir Samuel and Dr Clair Habib, began their AUSiMED Fellowships in 2022.

Nir is training Paediatric Trauma Care at the Alfred Hospital Trauma Services and the Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH) in Melbourne. Upon returning to Israel in early 2023, Nir is expecting to take on the Trauma Lead of Paediatric Emergency Department.

Dr Clair Habib (AUSiMED Fellow) and Dr Karen Teshuva (AUSiMED National Program Director)
Clair is receiving research and clinical training in neuro-genetics at the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute and RCH. Upon returning to Israel in September 2023, Clair is expecting to take on a senior role as a paediatric neuro-geneticist at Rambam Health Care Campus. Both Fellowships were made possible by the generous support of the Lowy Foundation.