Monash Translational Medicine

Did you miss last week's Beyond Blue 'Menopause Mindfield' webinar, featuring HER Centre Australia's Director Professor Jayashri Kulkarni AM? Taking a deep dive into the mental health impacts of perimenopause and menopause, you can catch up on the full webinar totally free via: https://lnkd.in/dvnw3CAk

Is it stigmatising to tell women they have an STI rather than a bacterial imbalance? "So far women are told that this is just an imbalance of their bacteria, and they are given cycle after cycle of antibiotics. It’s resulted, for many women, in a lot of distress and frustration with the health care profession. "My answer is simply: “.. it is doing women an enormous disservice to withhold that information. It is doing their partners an enormous disservice to withhold that information. And so it is important to actually call out transmission of BV, to be brave enough to do it.” And I use the word “brave” because there is pushback about this." Hear more from Dr Lenka Vodstrcil and Prof Catriona Bradshaw on the latest Scientific American podcast. #Monash #TranslationalMedicine #SexualHealth #BV Melbourne Sexual Health Centre Alfred Health https://lnkd.in/gajAiSx6

Dr Mahima Kapoor (Post-doctoral fellow, Department of Neuroscience and Head of Alfred Neuromuscular Service) has received a Monash University Advancing Women's Success Grant, through one of the Gender Equity programs - https://lnkd.in/gy428vUV She will receive professional career coaching to support her career planning and goals for progression to a mid-career researcher - congratulations Mahima! 👏 😊 #career #coaching #emcr #translational #equity

Congratulations to our clinician scientists based at Alfred Health and our department of Neuroscience, on introducing a surgical technique that is already making a huge difference to people's lives. Laser interstitial thermal therapy (LITT) allows neurosurgeons to treat epilepsy and brain tumours using a minimally invasive method. The Alfred is the first hospital in Victoria to offer this technique, which is now the first-line therapy in the leading epilepsy surgery and brain tumour treatment centres in the US and Europe. Our Head of School and Alfred Brain program director Terence O'Brien told the Herald Sun that this technique offers an alternative when epilepsy drugs and surgery are not suitable or effective. Matthew Gutman Joshua Laing Lindy Jeffree #Monash #TranslationalMedicine #Neuroscience #Epilepsy #Surgery https://lnkd.in/gvQSQVmd

📣 New publication alert involving TrialHub. Improving participation of culturally and linguistically diverse participants in clinical trials: an expert consultation. Our director Anne Woollett and Professor Stephen Jane, Director of Research Alfred Health & oversees TrialHub, shared their experiences of how we can overcome barriers to participation and create more inclusive clinical trial processes. Read here: https://lnkd.in/ge7xbDGp Congratulations to the fellow authors; Eliza Watson, Hannah Gulline, and Darshini Ayton. Monash Public Health and Preventive Medicine

#MultipleSclerosis affects three times more women than men. Usually diagnosed between the ages of 20-40, many women will start or continue to expand their families with a diagnosis of MS. What an absolute privilege to speak at the #AAN2025 meeting on women’s health and pregnancy. With standing room only and another 110 people online it was so heartening to see so much interest in this important area of clinical care. I got to cover fertility, fecundity, assisted reproductive technology, fetal outcomes, maternal complications, breastfeeding, and #pregnancy impacts on the clinical course of MS. A world wind tour of key clinical considerations. Tag teaming with Kerstin Hellwig speaking to MS therapy use around pregnancy, and Riley Bove on all things gynaecological and menopause-related. Thank goodness my jet lag waned for the duration of my talk!!

New preprint alert ⏰ My team and I are pleased to share our most recent story about how bacterial pathogen (Streptococcus pyogenes, Strep A) exposure induces antibody responses against glycan and protein antigens. As T cells can’t “see” sugar molecules via their T cell receptor, the text books say that antibody responses to sugars occur without T cell help. T cell help is critical for germinal centres (GC), a specialised lymphoid structure where the antibody sequence on B cells undergo mutations with the aim of increasing binding strength. We asked - is this dogma correct when sugar-specific B cells could engulf whole bacteria? (As they contain proteins for T cells to recognise). We focussed on #StrepA, where the sugar (GAC) is a leading glycoconjugate #vaccine candidate. By studying human blood, spleen and tonsils, including samples from a Strep A human challenge model, we show that sugar B cell responses shift from IgM towards IgG and IgA memory with age and antigen exposure. We found that Strep A infection induced sugar B cells to enter the Germinal centre where they became highly mutated. How were they doing this? By comparing to protein responses (SpyCEP) we found that sugar B cells had a molecular signature consistent with receiving reduced T cell help. We conclude that mucosal pathogen encounters elicit glycan responses that class-switch, evolve and diversify through the GC. ( 📖 👊 take that textbook!) These findings reveal how age and infection history can influence the quality, quantity, and isotype use of sugar-specific B cells. This work has important implications for the design and schedule of glycan-containing vaccines. Congrats to first authors Holly Fryer and Cathy Pitt, and all my co-authors many of whom provided the amazing clinical samples that powered this research. Monash Translational Medicine Murdoch Children's Research Institute (MCRI) Burnet Institute For paper: SSRN  https://lnkd.in/gry_vKNT biorxiv : doi: https://lnkd.in/gvBCtrx6 Key funding from National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC), Human Immunome Project Michelson Medical Research Foundation

Remarkable news this week about a Welsh study that found an association between shingles vaccination and lower rates of dementia diagnosis. Our Professor of Infectious Diseases, Joseph Doyle, urged caution in expert commentary to Scimex.org - Breaking science news for Australia and New Zealand: "...we need to be cautious in assuming the vaccine itself caused this decline in dementia diagnoses. It is plausible that episodes of infection, immune system changes, or health care engagement are among the factors behind this association, but further research is needed to help determine whether there is a causal link. "While we do not know whether the newer shingles vaccine used locally has the same association with less dementia yet, we do know the shingles vaccine provided free in Australia is very effective and protective against episodes of shingles." #Monash #TranslationalMedicine #InfectiousDiseases #Vaccination #Shingles https://lnkd.in/gEs6FKcy

Dr Georgia Symons is leading the “Therapeutic intervention for intimate partner violence” research project based at The Alfred Centre.   The team is seeking people with a history of intimate partner violence who are interested in participating in a four-week daily exercise program on a stationary bike or stretching to look at persistent symptoms of concussion and post-traumatic stress disorder 🧠   This project has been reviewed and approved by the Monash University Human Research Ethics Committee, ID 40295.   🔗 If you would to participate, please click on this link to sign up: https://lnkd.in/giDV2WMw   📩 Please contact Dr Georgia Symons for more information and visit here: https://lnkd.in/g6XEizfQ

Associate Professor Joanne Fielding, from the Department of Neuroscience, spoke to the Herald Sun about a new smartphone app called BrainEye that has been developed to track changes in brain function in real time and track a user’s progress over time. An AFL-backed clinical trial at Monash University found the app delivered a 100 per cent success rate in helping detect past concussions #concussion #neuroscience #translational #screening #technology https://lnkd.in/gVfe99cA