Media Releases
October 2009
Premier opens Wesley Research Institute's major expansion
The Wesley Research Institute (WRI) marked a major expansion today when the Premier of Queensland, the Hon Anna Bligh MP, officially opened the Health and Medical Research Centre (HMRC).
The HMRC occupies the top floor of the new eight-storey East Wing of the Wesley Hospital where the WRI is based.
Construction of the HMRC was financed by a $10 million competitively obtained grant from the Queensland Government’s Innovation Building Fund. Research facilities and projects in the Centre are being progressively funded from companies, philanthropic individuals and other sources.
The HMRC will broaden and accelerate the WRI’s distinctive work. WRI concentrates its research on immediate improvements in the care and quality of life of patients, easing their pain and suffering and returning them to their homes and communities as quickly as possible. WRI’s research by doctors and allied health professionals targets faster, more accurate diagnosis, fewer, less severe side effects, and new treatments for quicker, improved recovery.
Health priorities to be pursued in the HMRC include cancer, cardiovascular disease, nutrition, diabetes and obesity, respiratory, women’s health including fertility, men’s health including prostate cancer, and wound and bone healing.
The HMRC will increase significantly the level of scientifically and financially efficient collaboration under which WRI partners with local, national and international organisations including the Queensland University of Technology, the University of Queensland, Griffith University, the Queensland Institute of Medical Research, and several hospitals.
Collaborative research with other institutions will be facilitated, and for the first time they will have a substantial research presence on a private hospital campus. The Centre will offer a comprehensive range of resources, research and training facilities and staff to support clinical research.
The Centre will generate a return on the investment with a stronger health care workforce, improved outcomes for patients including reduced costs to health care and shorter hospital stays in the long term in both the public and private sectors.
Professor Julie Campbell AO, Director of the Wesley Research Institute, said that creating a research precinct at the heart of one of the largest not-for-profit private hospitals in Australia makes sense.
“Clinical research simply cannot operate in silos so this new facility will provide an important link between science and clinical practice,” she said.
“Collaboration will mean we aren’t doubling up and wasting time and money. Instead, we’ve created a research precinct that will do exactly what it’s meant to do – get better results for patients faster.”
The HMRC is enlarging the facilities and increasing the research activities of the WRI in a wide range of important directions.
Metabolic Laboratory and Bod Pod – the Bod Pod is a computerised, egg-shaped chamber which uses modern technology to calculate body fat and muscle mass, and contributes to research into nutrition intervention in diabetes and obesity, as well as cancer with a particular focus on prostate cancer.
Cecil Sinnamon Nursing Research Centre – to encourage and facilitate nurses to carry out research that will improve their healthcare practices. Past research by nurses has led to elderly patients having greater mobility and independence following illness and disease.
Simon Axelsen Research Library – providing researchers with electronic access to scientific information from wide ranging international sources.
Mitsubishi Development Rural and Research Health Centre – using latest communications technology to support patients and their doctors in isolated communities where chronic diseases are more prevalent and depression and the lack of psychiatric help can impede people in regaining their health.
John and Wendy Thorsen Women’s Health Laboratory – facilitating genetic research, and infectious causes of infertility.
Other facilities in the Centre include a Diagnostic Systems Laboratory, Biostatistics Laboratory, and state-of-the-art conference and training rooms.
In addition to investigator-initiated research, WRI conducts clinical trials and also has Queensland’s first purpose-built tissue bank which is a valuable resource for investigating the origins and development of cancer and other diseases. The construction of the Clinical Trials Centre and Tissue Bank was supported by the Queensland Government.
2009 marks WRI’s 15th year of providing excellence in medical research leading to improved health outcomes for people in Queensland, across Australia and around the world.
