Conference Program

Keynote Speakers

Professor Rosemary (Rosie) Purcell

Professor Rosemary (Rosie) Purcell is the Director of Knowledge Translation at Orygen in Melbourne, Australia, where she also leads the Elite Sport and Mental Health team. She is also Head of Department (delegate) of the Centre for Youth Mental Health at the University of Melbourne, and a registered psychologist. Rosie has a focus on world-class translation of mental health research into practice and is a member of the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) Elite Athlete Mental Health Consensus Group, the IOC’s 9-person Mental Health Working Group, and an invited member of the 2023 IOC Expert Consensus Group on Age Eligibility. Professor Purcell’s primary research interests are understanding mental health problems in elite athletes and developing optimal strategies for improving and maximising mental health and wellbeing in sporting environments. She has co-authored over 150 publications in the areas of youth mental health, and mental health in elite sport. As an expert in the field of mental health and elite sport, we are excited to have Professor Purcell as one of our Keynote speakers at GAMeS 2022.

Keynote Title: Creating mentally healthy elite sporting environments

Dr Kate Hall

Dr Kate Hall is a clinical psychologist, senior academic and the Head of Mental Health and Wellbeing at the Australian Football League (AFL). Her clinical research track record focuses on the mental health of adolescents and young adults and she has a national reputation in translating research into policy and practice to ultimately improve mental health and wellbeing outcomes for individuals and communities. Dr Hall has worked with AFL and AFLW footballers for many years to address mental health conditions and optimise wellbeing. In her role as Head of Mental Health and Wellbeing at the AFL, she is leading an industry-wide Mental Health Strategy that has a dual focus: the prevention of mental health issues and safe and effective interventions to address any emergent mental health needs.

Keynote Title: The pandemic’s mental health legacy in professional sport: Driving a wellbeing culture and embedding mentally healthy systems across the AFL while navigating COVID19 seasons.

Workshops

Concussion across the full spectrum - the multiple avenues for psychological intervention

In this 2-hour workshop A/Prof Gardner will provide an overview of concussion from a clinical, research, and policy development perspective. Attendees will have a greater understanding of concussion prevention, identification via video analysis, acute assessment and the validation of various measures, and the evaluation of later life brain and mental health of former athletes. The translational focus of research to advance knowledge and improve health care by generating evidence-informed data to advance policy development will also be discussed. The value-add of psychological input and the role a psychologist may play at each level will also be discussed.

Workshop facilitator: Honorary Associate Professor Gardner is a mid-career research fellow with the School of Medicine & Public Health at The University of Newcastle, and the Hunter Medical Research Institute (HMRI), as well as a Co-Director of the Hunter New England Local Health District (HNE LHD)’s Sport Concussion Clinic. He serves as a member of the World Rugby concussion working group, and is the concussion consultant to Rugby Australia. He is a member of the concussion scientific advisory group for the Australian Football League (AFL). He is an Associate Editor of the Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport. A/Prof Gardner is a clinical neuropsychologist with over a decade of experience working clinically and conducting research across the full spectrum of concussion.

This workshop is free for all conference delegates.