NHMRC Senior Research Fellow

B.App.Sc.(Speech Path)(Cumb)
PhD University of Sydney

Traumatic brain injury; Communication partner training; Discourse and sociolinguistics; Legal issues for people with neurogenic communication disorders; Aphasia

Leanne is a speech pathologist who has worked in the area of communication disorders following brain injury for over 20 years. Leanne is a Senior Research Fellow of the National Health and Medical Research Council and a Principal Research Fellow of the University of Sydney. Leanne's work has led to a new focus on the importance of providing communicative opportunities for people with brain injury, particularly, by training people with brain injury and their communication partners.  Leanne has worked with the NSW Police Service to improve police officers' interactions with people with brain injury, developed a training program for staff in collaboration with the Attorney General's Department of NSW to improve access to legal services for people who cannot speak, and she is now examining the efficacy of training communication partners of people with traumatic brain injury.

Leanne is involved in 2 evidence based practice initiatives; the first of which systematically evaluates the available evidence for psychological interventions for people with acquired brain injuries from age 5 onwards (Tate, McDonald, Perdices, Togher & Moseley).  The results of PsycBITE^TM (Psychological database for Brain Impairment Treatment Efficacy) are available on the world-wide-web free of charge (www.psycbite.com). Leanne leads the speechBITE^TM (Speech Pathology database for Best Interventions and Treatment Efficacy) team, based at The University of Sydney, which documents treatment evidence for the Speech Pathology profession and is also freely available (www.speechbite.com).

Leanne is a consortium member of AphasiaBank (www.talkbank.org/AphasiaBank), a group of international researchers interested in the assessment of communication disorders, led by Professor Brian MacWhinney, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, USA.

Leanne has published over 40 journal articles in international peer reviewed journals, 7 book chapters and co-edited a book about communication disorders following TBI. She now supervises 8 post graduate students and has been awarded almost $6 million in research funding to date.