Metro North Scholarships and Fellowships for CCRG team member

Congratulations to CCRG’s A/Prof Gianluigi Li Bassi and Clinical Nurse Researcher Claire Wilson, who have been announced as recipients of a Scholarship and a Fellowship from Metro North Health Services.

Above: CCRG Nurse Researcher Claire Wilson, and A/Prof Gianluigi Li Bassi, Lead, CCRG PRIMELab

One of Metro North’s initiatives to create integrated research career pathways is through their Pre-Research Higher Degree (RHD) Scholarships. The RHD Scholarships are designed to enable clinicians to further develop their research plan, methodology and supervision plans, with the goal of achieving enrolment in a Research Higher Degree (Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) or Masters of Philosophy (MPhil)) by 31 December 2026.

Congratulations to Claire Wilson who has been named as a recipient for a 2025 Metro North RHD Scholarships.

Claire, who is part of the CCRG Clinical Research team, will look further into alcohol use disorders and alcohol withdrawal syndrome in the intensive care unit.

Similarly, the Metro North Fellowship program is designed to allow clinicians to develop and advance a body of work aimed at creating a strong foundation of evidence-based healthcare.

A/Prof Gianluigi Li Bassi, who lead's CCRG’s PRIMELab has been announced as a recipient of the Fellowship for 2025 for his study A Breath of Fresh Air in ARDS: From the Sunshine State to the World - New Pathophysiology Discoveries, Treatments and Reducing Harm/Costs.

This program of research will seek to advance the understanding of Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS) pathophysiology, enhance treatment and reduce iatrogenic harm/costs. He will lead a program to characterise dissemination of infection/inflammation through the airways, during the early-stage of ARDS, distinguishing the process from dissemination via the bloodstream.

“We will achieve this by using an innovative model of P. aeruginosa ARDS that we have recently developed, in which single-lung ventilation/perfusion is fully isolated,’ explains A/Prof Li Bassi.

“Furthermore, we’ll investigate the use of adjunctive nebulized-amikacin alongside intravenous-antibiotics in preclinical studies to provide insight for the design of future clinical trials.”