Research Officer

• Fantastic opportunity to provide technical knowledge and expertise to the Chief Investigator, Senior Research Academics and research team and support the NHMRC funded project “Optimising Functional Independence of Older Persons with Dementia”
• Located at Susan Wakil School of Nursing and Midwifery, Mallet Street, Camperdown Campus
• Fixed Term, part-time 0.6FTE (3 days per week) and base salary $84K p.a prorata plus superannuation

About the opportunity 

The Research Officer will be responsible for providing technical knowledge and expertise to the Chief Investigator, Senior Research Academics and the research team to support the research and clinical trial requirements for the NHMRC funded project “Optimising Functional Independence of Older Persons with Dementia: Implementation and Evaluation of the Interdisciplinary Home-bAsed Reablement Program (I-HARP)” and other dementia research opportunities.

This includes actively contributing to research activities, collecting and managing outcome data, conducting telephone and face-to-face interviews and assessments with participants with dementia and their family carers, and undertaking other core aspects of research work. The Research Officer collates and records research data, draws insights and analyses, and reports information from the research undertaken.

About you

The University values courage and creativity; openness and engagement; inclusion and diversity; and respect and integrity. As such, we see the importance of recruiting talent aligned to these values and are looking for a Research Officer who:

• Honours degree in Psychology or a related discipline. May have (or be working towards) postgraduate qualifications or have extensive specialist experience in the field of research.
• demonstrated experience conducting participant/client interviews, cognitive testing, and administering/scoring questionnaires.
• experience working with older people and people with cognitive impairment, knowledge of dementia subtypes and exposure to clinical/diagnostic interviewing.
• extensive experience in developing and working on research projects, including expertise in using research protocols, experimental design, ethics submissions, and carrying out scientific literary searches.
• a valid driver’s licence and a vehicle, and availability to travel around greater Sydney

The successful candidate will also have excellent interpersonal and written communication skills and a demonstrated level of tact and discretion in dealing with various stakeholders (e.g. study participants and members of the public) and excellent attention to detail and experience using data management programs such as REDCap, Microsoft Excel, SPSS.

About us

Sydney Nursing School of Nursing and Midwifery belongs to a research intensive university and sits within the University of Sydney’s Faculty of Medicine and Health, enabling both staff and students to experience the multiple aspects of the Australian Health care system within a global context.

The Susan Wakil School of Nursing and Midwifery’s main academic activities are teaching, research and scholarship, together with practice and policy development and engagement with all health professions. We also provide advice and consultancy across many key areas of nursing and midwifery.  The focus of our scholarship is to improve health outcomes, the quality of care, and the health related experience of people at times of vulnerability.

One of the school’s research streams is Chronic disease and Ageing, and Professor Yun-Hee Jeon, the Susan and Isaac Wakil Chair of Healthy Ageing, takes leadership in this stream. The program of research focuses on improving the quality of life of persons with dementia through person-centred care, building capacity of the aged care workforce, bettering measures of quality and outcomes in dementia and aged care, understanding the experiences of older people with chronic illness, and developing and establishing evidence for new models of care and translating evidence into practice in the care of older people. 

The Research Officer will work with Professor Yun-Hee Jeon and her research team on the NHMRC funded project I-HARP (the Interdisciplinary Home-bAsed Reablement Program) and other dementia research opportunities. The I-HARP project implements and evaluates a novel bio-behavioural-environmental model into existing health and aged care services. I-HARP is designed to improve functional independence of community dwelling older people with dementia. The overarching design is a mixed-method action research approach using a multi-centre pragmatic parallel-arm randomised trial, conducted in four phases over a three-year period, at two hospital based and two community based aged care services.

Since our inception 160 years ago, the University of Sydney has led to improve the world around us. We believe in education for all and that effective leadership makes lives better. These same values are reflected in our approach to diversity and inclusion, and underpin our long-term strategy for growth. We’re Australia's first university and have an outstanding global reputation for academic and research excellence. Across our campuses, we employ over 7600 academic and non-academic staff who support over 60,000 students.