Enrol now for second semester

Applications for postgraduate study will close on 13 July for domestic students and 20 July for international students.

SPH courses are some of the most comprehensive in population health. Programs cover public health, international public health, health promotion, alcohol, tobacco and other drugs, epidemiology, Indigenous health, health economics, biostatistics and nutrition. More information on all courses can be found here.

For more information about SPH programs or enrolling to study, please contact enquiries@sph.uq.edu.au or call (07) 3365 5442.

SPH's timetable for semester 2 courses is now available here.

Tobacco control and fertility were the subjects of the outstanding research theses.

2 May 2012

One-in-four women with a history of infertility may still end up having a baby without treatment, a new SPH study shows.

The study by researchers at the School of Population Health and UQ's Centre for Clinical Research reveals that women who have been clinically diagnosed as infertile after 12 months of unsuccessfully trying for a baby may actually just need longer to conceive.

"Many women aged up to 36 years with a history of infertility, especially those who have already had a baby, can achieve spontaneous conception and live birth without using fertility treatment, indicating they are sub-fertile, rather than infertile," said the study's lead author, Dr Danielle Herbert.

The study shows one-in-four Australian women aged 28-36 years who reported a history of infertility had a baby without using fertility treatment and a further one-in-four had a baby after undergoing fertility treatment, which included IVF or fertility hormones, such as Clomid. Half of those women who had not used treatment had already had a baby prior to reporting infertility.

Dr Herbert said the national study, which appears in the journal Fertility and Sterility, offers a more complete picture of infertility in Australia, compared to previous clinic-based studies.

"The strength of this study is the inclusion of all women with a self-reported history of infertility," Dr Herbert explains.

"That means that women who have experienced difficulty falling pregnant but not sought treatment are included as well as women who do seek treatment but do not become pregnant."

The research is part of the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health which has followed more than 8,000 women since 1996. This latest data comes from surveys conducted in 2006 and 2009.

For women who did have a baby, there was no difference in pregnancy complications -- including stillbirths or premature births -- between those who did and those who didn't use fertility treatment. Women who received fertility treatment were more likely to have twins.

Dr Herbert said that while the study has its limitations -- researchers do not know if women changed male partners during the study period -- it provides important evidence that can help doctors decide when best to start patients on fertility treatment.

"These findings are particularly encouraging for women aged up to 36 years who have previously had a baby, or been diagnosed with unexplained infertility -- that is, the woman is ovulating regularly and her partner is making good quality sperm -- to persevere to conceive without treatment. "

More information:

Dr Danielle Herbert

T: 07 3346 5223

E: d.herbert@sph.uq.edu.au

26 April 2012

A new PhD research opportunity is available to explore the complex interaction between environmental risk factors and the burden of disease among children in Australia.

Professor Alan Lopez, Head of the School of Population Health, has been elected Chair of the Executive Board of the Health Metrics Network (HMN), an independent partnership hosted by the World Health Organization designed to improve health information systems in poorer countries.

Several opportunities are available for students to join SPH's vibrant research culture. 

Opportunities illustrate the diversity of the School's research programs and include the chance to work on projects investigating nutrition; parasitic diseases; longitudinal studies; the health effects of sedentary behaviour; and hospital-based pathogens. More information on specific projects can be found below: 

Mathetical modelling of parasitic co-infection

Public health nutrition

A life course approach to women's health

Measuring and analysing 'sitting time'

Reducing prolonged sitting time in adults

Clostridium difficile: assessing the risks to Australia

 Interested students should email RHD@sph.uq.edu.au or call 07 3365 5393. More general Information about research degrees at the School of Population Health can be found here.

Doctors could soon be able to predict the type and duration of menopausal symptoms an individual woman is likely to experience thanks to new findings from the The University of Queensland (UQ).

Working in collaboration with the UK Medical Research Council, the UQ research team expects the discoveries will allow doctors to give patients more details on the symptoms they experience leading up to menopause, as well as an idea of their likely duration after menopause.

The research team, led by Professor Gita Mishra from UQ' School of Population Health, found that the severity and range of health symptoms experienced through midlife formed into groups and distinct patterns but only some of these, such as vasomotor symptoms (hot flushes and cold or night sweats) were related to the timing of the menopause.

"Women who experienced only minimal symptoms before their last period were unlikely to develop severe symptoms later, while for others the timing of symptoms relative to menopause was key to understanding the likely duration of their symptoms," Professor Mishra said.

The UK study used annual surveys from more than 600 women with natural menopause to identify four groups of symptoms: psychological (eg. anxiety and depression), somatic (eg. headaches and joint pain), vasomotor and sexual discomfort. Women who had undergone hormone treatment or hysterectomies were excluded from the study.

Researchers found that by examining the timing and severity of symptoms, they were able to classify women according to different profiles for each group of symptoms. For instance, with some women, the severity of vasomotor symptoms increased leading up to menopause and then tended to decline, while for others whose vasomotor symptoms started and peaked later, symptoms were likely to last four years or more into post-menopause.

The UK study also found that women with higher education levels and social class were less likely to experience vasomotor symptoms than other women.

The UQ study was based on multiple surveys of mid-age women from the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health. Professor Mishra said that she was reassured that, in spite of differences in the surveys used, both studies had identified similar groups and profiles for the severity of symptoms experienced through the menopausal transition.

"While we would still like to see findings from other studies, we do think that symptom profiles are part of a move towards a more tailored approach -- where health professionals can make a clearer assessment of what women can expect based on their history of symptoms -- and this may be worthwhile not only in terms of reassurance but in selecting treatment options."

More details on the Medical Research Council National Survey of Health and Development used in the UK study can be found at www.nshd.mrc.ac.uk. The UK study is published in the BMJ (GD Mishra, D Kuh. 'Health symptoms during midlife in relation to menopausal transition: British prospective cohort study. 344:e402).

Further information on the Australian Longitudinal Study of Women's Health based at UQ and the University of Newcastle can be found at www.alswh.org.au. The UQ study is published in Menopause (GD Mishra, AJ Dobson 'Using longitudinal profiles to characterize women's symptoms through midlife: results from a large prospective study'. PMID: 22198658).

More information

Professor Gita Mishra

g.mishra@sph.uq.edu.au

T: 07 3365 5224

Kirsten Rogan (media)

k.rogan@uq.edu.au

T: 07 3346 5308