News and events

2022 has been another challenging year due to the pandemic and natural disasters however things are gradually looking up and we can reflect on another significant year for our network – despite these things!

This year also marks the third year of our 2020-2024 NHMRC Centre for Research Excellence (CRE) collaboration which will continue to support a program of excellent research in the years to come.

Please join us in reflecting on these and other outstanding achievements:

• PREDICT now has 183 members – in the past year we welcomed 34 new members.
• PREDICT has continued working actively with consumers in our research. Our mental health consumer group recruited for “The Kids are not Okay” program of research has been actively involved in the development and fine tuning of the Mental Health Delphi project, the PEACHY O and M studies, and the Prospective Observational study.
• We have commenced a Head injury/Concussion Co-design project that involves parents, youths and clinicians working in partnership to develop discharge materials for children with mild head injury/concussion. Lots of valuable insight has been gained to date.
• 47 hospitals across Australia and New Zealand have been actively involved in PREDICT research!
• This year we have had 2 large successful grants to the value of $6.4M.
• The Acute Head Injury Guidelines are completed and are available on our website! Supplementary materials, including a video on use of the head injury algorithm, and other education modules, are now also available.
• A mRNA Vaccine Chest Pain guideline has been developed in collaboration with ATAGI (Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation), IMAC (Immunisation Advisory Centre NZ) and CSANZ (Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand) to support an approach to the initial assessment and workup of children and adolescents presenting to the ED with vaccine-related symptoms. This is available on our website now with a recent update added in September 2022.
• Our two committed teams undertaking Cochrane reviews continue to progress work on:
  “Triage tools for detecting cervical spine injury in paediatric trauma patients”
  “Parenteral medication for the management of acute severe behavioural disturbance (ASBD) in the emergency department” 
• A number of studies are now well underway and recruiting this year after significant preparatory work and overcoming teething problems.  These include: The Sepsis Observational (SENTINEL) study, currently enrolling in Australia and New Zealand (11 sites). The PEACHY O and PEACHY M RCT studies which focus on the care of children with acute severe behavioural disturbance in the ED are currently enrolling (7 sites + addition of 3 new sites); the SONIC study; and the Bronchiolitis Sustainability study is also underway with 23 Australian and New Zealand sites participating: the SPASMS project (on assessment of abdominal pain has commenced recruiting in WA with other sites identified and commencing in 2023.
• We continue to undertake work collaboratively with the international PERN Pediatric Emergency Research Network) group on the PERN COVID 19 project, and the PAINT study (Pain Management and Sedation in Pediatric Ileocolic Intussusception: A Global Multicenter, Retrospective Study). With PERC we continue to recruit in the BIPED study (Dexamethasone and Adrenalin for bronchiolitis) and our other international studies include the PROMPT Bolus Study (with PECARN (US) and PERC (Canada)).
• Kids THRIVE – the RCT on high flow for intubation has completed enrolment.
• BELLPiC – the RCT has been published in Neurology and further secondary papers are in draft from or have been submitted.
• Data analysis is complete and papers are underway for COVID 19 Audit; Western Australia Bronchiolitis Knowledge Translation Adaptability study; PERN pneumonia; PAINT study; Deferred Consent and the PARIS II.
• The PREDICT Executive reviewed and endorsed 11 new projects, many of which are now in various stages of development.
• We continue to mentor 10 PhD scholars and congratulate 2 PhD students- Sharon O’Brien (Perth) and Sonia Singh (UC Davis/Melbourne) – have recently submitted their thesis!
• Thirteen papers were published in various journals including The Lancet, Archives of Disease in Childhood, Neurology, BMC Health Services Research, BMJ Open Respiratory Research, Journal of Paediatrics and Child Health, Emergency Medicine Journal, Paediatric Critical Care, Medical Journal Australia and others!
• The annual PREDICT members meeting was held in October in Melbourne with a live and online audience of 65 members.  It was great to be able to see people again!

Thank you to all members and collaborators for your contributions and support.

Dear PREDICT Members,

This is a reminder that we are calling for nominations for the Research Assistant and for the Research Higher Degree positions on the PREDICT Executive.

The nominations period closes on Friday 2nd of December 2022.

Please feel free to contact Cate Wilson if you have any questions or wish to discuss involvement in anyway (best to email or call or we can set up a quick zoom!).

These positions are usually held for 1 – 2 years and are selected by the existing Executive following your expression of interest.

To be eligible, you need to be an existing PREDICT member.

If you wish to nominate yourself please email me with the following details:

• Your title and name
• Your craft group and current position held
• The primary organisation you work with
• The state you are based in
• Please write a brief description of why you wish to be part of the PREDICT Executive and what skills you bring.  If you are a Research Higher Degree candidate please tell us what RHD you are undertaking and describe your research area of interest and your long term goals.
• Please attach a brief CV

Taking part in the PREDICT Executive involves:

• Attending approximately 10 monthly meetings per year (approximately 3 face to face and 6-7 teleconferences if no pandemics!)
• Previewing the executive agenda then actively participating in meetings to give an independent opinion/ advice.
• Bringing issues of importance to the network, to the meeting agenda for discussion
• Reviewing and commenting on new studies when they are presented to the Executive
• Following up on actions deemed necessary at the meetings.
• Reviewing and commenting on issues via email / telephone in between meetings as required.
• Helping to develop and then reinforcing PREDICT research guidelines and policy with members locally
• Maintaining confidentiality in relation to sensitive issues discussed
• Chairing sessions at the PREDICT members meeting upon request

Congratulations to the following PREDICT authors:

Bourke EM, Knott JC, Craig S, Babl FE; Paediatric Research in Emergency Departments International Collaborative (PREDICT) Research Network. Management of paediatric acute severe behavioural disturbance in emergency departments across Australia: A PREDICT survey of senior medical staff. Emerg Med Australas. 2022 Nov 3. doi: 10.1111/1742-6723.14105. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 36328402.

Borland ML, Dalziel SR, Phillips N, Dalton S, Lyttle MD, Bressan S, Oakley E, Kochar A, Furyk J, Cheek JA, Neutze J, Eapen N, Hearps SJ, Rausa VC, Babl FE; Paediatric Research in Emergency Department International Collaborative (PREDICT) group. Incidence of traumatic brain injuries in head-injured children with seizures. Emerg Med Australas. 2022 Nov 2. doi: 10.1111/1742-6723.14112. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 36323396.

 

 

 

 

The annual PREDICT members meeting was held on Thursday October 20th 2022 with 30 people attending in person (in Melbourne at the Larwill hotel) and another 26 – 36 online at various stages of the meeting.   

The meeting included a range of informative presentations from the project leads covering projects now analysed, those in development and those that are currently active.  It was also a great opportunity to hear ideas for new research projects and to thrash these out with the membership.  We also enjoyed hearing from our Research Higher Degree students, (both new students, just completed and post doctorate stages) about the trials and tribulations of doing a PhD and what it involved and demanded of them to take this journey.   

We thank everyone who involved (presenters, chairs and audience) and hope you enjoyed it.  Apologies for the technical issues experienced at the beginning of the meeting that affected the sound and visuals for the online audience – running hybrid events is a new thing for us and our technical support was not as good as it could have been.

We look forward to another exciting year of collaborative research and another meeting in 2023!

Each two years the eight positions on the PREDICT Executive are re-elected.  This year there were exactly eight nominees from our membership, so all of these people automatically became the new Executive members (without further vote) and they selected a new Chair and two Vice Chairs.

Congratulation to:

• Simon Craig – Chair
• Elliot Long – vice Chair (1)
• Shane George – Vice chair (2)
• Amanda Williams
• Sharon O’Brien
• Bronwyn Griffin
• Libby Haskell
• Natalie Phillips

The Executive also elects non-officio Executive members for their support and expertise.  These members include:

• Meredith Borland (Past Chair)
• Franz Babl
• Stuart Dalziel
• Emma Tavender
• Cate Wilson
• Ed Oakley

We will also be calling for a Research Assistant and a Research Higher Degree candidate in the next months.

Finally, we would like to thank Meredith Borland for her work as Chair of PREDICT over the past four years – her commitment to this role has been exceptional. 

Perth Children’s Hospital paediatric emergency trainee, Dr Wei Hao Lee, has been awarded the prestigious Telethon Fellowship for his research study into improving the diagnosis and management of appendicitis in children. The SPASMs trial has been endorsed by PREDICT with PCH being the primary site and starting recruitment on 1^st November 2022. Eight other sites are hoping to commence in the new year.   Read the full story here.”

 

Each year at the Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM) Annual Scientific Conference, the prestigious Elizabeth Molyneux Prize is awarded. The prize, named in honour of Professor Elizabeth Molyneux, recognises outstanding work in the field of Paediatric Emergency Medicine (PEM).  This year, the prize was awarded to PREDICT for the paper “Prednisolone for Bell’s Palsy in children: A randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled, multicentre trial” which was presented by Franz Babl at the annual conference in Belfast, UK 4 – 6 October 2022.
Congratulations to the BellPIC team!

 

Congratulations to the following PREDICT authors:

O’Brien S, Haskell L, Schembri R, Gill FJ, Wilson S, Borland ML, Oakley E, Dalziel SR; Paediatric Research in Emergency Departments International Collaborative (PREDICT) network, Australasia.
Prevalence of high flow nasal cannula therapy use for management of infants with bronchiolitis in Australia and New Zealand.
J Paediatr Child Health. 2022 Sep 6. doi: 10.1111/jpc.16199. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 36066264.