PhD scholarships available on improving access to primary care for vulnerable people

Vulnerable populations currently face considerable barriers in getting the sort of primary care that they require. Canada and Australia are two of many countries trying to improve their systems for delivering primary healthcare.

Our international Centre of Research Excellence, Innovative Models Promoting Access-to-care Transformation (IMPACT), will discover and trial world’s best practice innovations to help vulnerable people (e.g., refugees, people from indigenous communities, people on low incomes) access the primary care that fits their needs.


Two opportunities are available to commence a PhD on a project within the IMPACT Centre of Research Excellence. Successful candidates will receive a three year PhD stipend valued at the Australian Postgraduate Association rate annually.

Although exact PhD topics will be negotiated with individual candidates, potential topics to be addressed include:

1. Is primary care in Australia as good as it can be? An international comparison

2. The right care at the right time in the right place: understanding the influence of local partnerships developing primary care interventions for vulnerable people

3. Evaluating innovative approaches to improving access to comprehensive PHC for vulnerable consumers in Community Health settings in Victoria

Please see visit the IMPACT website for more details.

Students will be based at either the Southern Academic Primary Care Research Institute, Monash University in Dandenong or the Australian Institute for Primary Care and Ageing, La Trobe University in Bundoora.

How to apply: submit a cover letter, CV and academic transcript to samantha.chakraborty@monash.edu.

Closing date: Friday 23 October 2014

For further enquiries or to submit your application please contact Dr Samantha Chakraborty +61 3 9902 9698 or e-mail:samantha.chakraborty@monash.edu