Vera Dimitropoulos - Co-Director

With a background in Health Information Management, Vera was the Executive Manager, Classification Development at the National Centre for Classification in Health at the University of Sydney until 2017 and now leads the Centre as Co-Director, together with Richard Madden. She is also a member of the Education and Implementation Committee within the World Health Organization’s Family of International Classifications Network and is working on ICD-11 as part of the International Joint Task Force.

Vera is currently on the Board of the Health Information Management Association of Australia (HIMAA) and is a Visiting Fellow at Western Sydney University working on the development of the Bachelor of Information and Communications Technology (Health Information Management). Vera is also Director for the Western Pacific Region, International Federation of Health Information Management Associations.

As well as her teaching roles within the University of Sydney and Western Sydney University, Vera has in the past managed major classification projects for the University of Sydney, most recently, the development of the AR-DRG Classification System which incorporates ICD-10-AM/ACHI/ACS and the AR-DRG classifications.

Professor Richard Madden - Co-Director

Richard is Director of the National Centre for Classification in Health, an international centre of excellence in health classifications. The Centre has responsibility for the Australian modification of the WHO’s International Classification of Diseases (ICD) and the Australian Classification of Health Interventions, and until the end of June 2017, the Australian casemix grouper, the AR-DRG classification.

Richard has led the WHO effort since 2007 to develop an International Classification of Health Interventions, with the latest Beta-2 version released in October 2018. He chaired/co-chaired the WHO Family of International Classifications (WHO-FIC) Family Development Committee from 2000 to 2012. The Committee is responsible for expanding the Family and seeking alignment across classifications. He chaired the WHO-FIC Network from 2003 to 2005.

Dr Anupama Ginige - Manager, Health Classification IT Systems

Dr Ginige is a senior academic of Western Sydney University, with 15 years of experience in computing and information communication technologies. Her speciality is in providing software solutions for health informatics, health information management and clinical classification system management. She had led several successful large-scale software development projects in clinical classification and clinical trial management domain. Her involvement in this field has given her the opportunity to contribute to efforts of the international networks such as WHO-FIC (WHO Family of International Classification).

Dr Julie Gordon - Research Fellow

Julie joined the NCCH in June 2017. Prior to this Julie spent 14 years at the Family Medicine Research Centre (University of Sydney) managing the ICPC-2 PLUS clinical terminology. Her role focuses on the development of classifications and clinical terminologies in general practice, particularly ICPC-2 PLUS and ICPC-2.

Julie holds a Bachelor of Applied Science in Health Information Management (Hons 1) and a PhD, both from the University of Sydney. Her PhD investigated the suitability of SNOMED CT for use in Australian general practice. She is a member of the Wonca International Classification Committee (WICC), and an elected member of its governance committee.

Filippa Pretty - Operations Coordinator, Classification Development

Filippa holds a degree in Bachelor of Applied Science, Health Information Management from the University of Sydney. She joined NCCH as a Classification Specialist in 2015 after an ongoing involvement with NCCH since 1998. Filippa has many years of experience working in the public and private health care systems in a variety of Clinical Coding, HIM and Coding Auditor roles predominantly in a contractor / consultancy capacity in Australia, New Zealand and Singapore.

Filippa has also participated in non-traditional tasks such as the Cross Border Care Type Change and Coding Audit, The NSW Ombudsman (Disability Death Review Team), The Commission for Children & Young People (Child Death Review Team), and code mapping phase of the ICU Clinical Information System (ICCIS) currently under development. Filippa has also previously been a representative on the board of the Clinical Coders Society of Australia (CCSA) and of the NSW Coding Advisory/Clinical Coding Leadership Group (CCLG).

Dr Qingsheng Zhou - Senior Research Fellow

Before joining NCCH, Qingsheng worked in a number of NSW human service agencies since the middle of the 1990s. Most recently, he was Director, Evidence Base Development, NSW Family and Community Services (FACS), and had responsibilities for developing evidence through statistical analysis, research, and evaluation to support strategic reforms. He has extensive experience in statistical modelling aimed at assessing the feasibility and impacts of major policy initiatives. He managed program and service planning processes and developed resource allocation formula and guidelines to support the delivery of the resulting plans. He was the NSW representative in several national minimum data collections such as Social Housing, Home and Community Care Program and Disability Services. He played an active role in developing national performance reporting frameworks and indicators for disability services and aged care services. He directed the development and implementation of FACS’ research grant and evaluation programs and contributed a great deal to many R&E projects.

While pursuing his PhD at the University of Sydney, Qingsheng was awarded scholarships and grants for his research projects. He also provided diverse research assistance to a range of other projects. He has lectured at the University of Sydney and Nanjing University (China) where he received his MSc and BSc qualifications.