Dr Nusrat Homaira | UNSW Research

My Expertise

Childhood respiratory infections, childhood asthma

Keywords

child health

Fields of Research (FoR)

Infectious Diseases, Respiratory Diseases, Epidemiology, Public Health and Health Services

SEO tags

Respiratory System and Diseases (incl. Asthma)

Biography

Dr Nusrat Homaira is a medically trained respiratory epidemiologist. She has over 15 years working experience in child health research in both low- and high-income countries. She is also an adjunct faculty and course co-ordinator (Epidemiology course) for the Master of Public Health at James P. Grant School of Public Health, BRAC University Bangladesh. Prior to coming to UNSW, Sydney she has worked as an Assistant Scientist, Centers for Communicable Diseases at the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b). Nusrat has expertise in wide range of research methodologies from outbreak investigation, designing and establishing surveillance, application and analysis of record-linked administrative health data ("big data"); to the design and conduct of randomised controlled trials, clinical surveys, diagnostic studies and longitudinal studies, systematic reviews and meta-analyses. She has previously held the Early Career Fellowship of the National Health and Medical Research Council of the Australian Government which has helped her to establish her program of research on common diseases of childhood which she leads within the discipline. Her current work centres around understanding and modifying the intersection between early childhood respiratory infections and chronic respiratory conditions in high-risk populations through epidemiological and health system research. Her research has directly influenced policy and clinical guidelines both nationally and internationally.

Dr Nusrat Homaira is an elected council member of the ISIRV Council (International Society of Influenza and Other Respiratory Viruses), reesrach sub-committee member and Lung Health Faculty for The Thoracic Society of Australia and New Zealand (TSANZ). She serves as an Academic Editor for PLoS One and PLoS Global Health. She is also a steering committee member of the Respiratory Clinical Academic Group (CAG) and Scientific Advisory Group of Triple I CAG of Sydney Partnership for Health, Education Research and Enterprise (SPHERE, Maridulu Budyari Gumal) and serves as a SPHERE Women's Health Research Champion.

My Grants

2024-2029: The National Paediatric Applied Research Translation Initiative (N-PARTI) funded through Medical Research Future Funds of the Australian government ( AUD 4.9 million CI Nusrat Homaira)

2023-2025: Monitoring the impact of severe RSV associated acute lower respiratory infection (ALRI) compared to non-RSV ALRIs in children aged<2 years: a multi-site prospective observational study. Investigator initiated grant funded by MSD Global (AUD 370,781, CIA Homaira)

2023-2024: Reaching the unreached: exploring factors affecting vaccine uptake and acceptance amongst zero-dose children and women in Bangladesh using the WHO behavioural and social drivers (BeSD) framework funded by SABIN vaccine (USD 69,937, CI Homaira)

2023: Improving paediatric asthma care, funded by philanthropy ( AUD 30,000 , CIA Homaira)

2022-2024: Asthma care from home, funded by Ministry of Health of New South Wales Government under the Translational Research Grant Scheme Round 6 (AUD 488,000, CIA Homaira)

2021-2023: CARE FROM HOME: Comprehensive community-based care coordination for management of childhood asthma, funded by the Asthma Australia and Sydney Children’s Hospitals Foundation (165, 000 AUD, CIA Homaira)

2021-2025: Reducing household air pollution exposure to improve early child health and development; extending the intervention and follow-up of "Poriborton: the CHANge trial", funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council of the Australian Government (AUD2,916,420, CI Homaira)

2019: Transplacental transfer of RSV (respiratory syncytial virus) antibody and its impact on respiratory infections in Aboriginal Children: RSV ReACh study funded by The Sydney Partnership for Health, Education, Research & Enterprise (SPHERE) (AUD 75,000 CIA Homaira)

2019: Enhanced integrated community-based asthma management pathway for children, funded by the Sydney Partnership for Health, Education, Research & Enterprise (SPHERE) (AUD 25,000 CIA Homaira)

2019-2022: Improving health care delivery services for children with asthma through an enhanced school-based influenza vaccination strategy funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council of the Australian Government (AUD 2,916,420, CIA Homaira)

2016-2018: Improving the health outcomes of children with asthma in New South Wales, funded by the Rotary Clun of Sydney (AUD 310,000 CIA Homaira)

2016: Identification of indoor localisation solutions for tracking patients in hospital environments to minimise cross- infection funded by CRC for Spatial Information (AUD 24,541, CIA Homaira)

My Qualifications

MBBS, MPH , PhD

My Awards

2019: Early career research fellowship of the National Health and Medical Research Council of the Australian Government

2018: Travel fellowship, 11^th International Symposium on Respiratory syncytial virus held in Ashville, USA

2018: Sanofi Pasteur Awards for Communicable Disease Epidemiology at the 18th International Congress on Infectious Disease

2016: Travel fellowship, 10^th International Symposium on Respiratory syncytial virus

2016: Fellowship, Croucher Summer Course on Vaccinology hosted by the University Hong Kong

2014: Travel Award, 9th International Symposium on Respiratory syncytial virus, South Africa

2012: World Health Organization’s travel fellowship, Incidence, Severity and Impact conference, Germany

2011: The Macrae Group Young Investigator Award and Travel Grant, The Wellcome Trust, XIII International Symposium on Respiratory Viral Infections, Rome, Italy

2010: International Research Award, Options VII for the Control of Influenza, Hong Kong

2009: Fellowship, European Educational Program, Florence, Italy

2009: Fellowship, Johns Hopkins Fall Institute In Public Health Policy And Management, Barcelona, Spain

2008: International Development Grant for Young Women Physicians, Scientists and other health care providers, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, 13th International Conference on Infectious

Disease (ICID), Bangkok, Thailand

My Research Activities

My career as a public health professional started in 2006 as a Senior Medical Officer for the Maternal Neonatal and Child Health Program of BRAC where I was providing technical expertise for developing community based model of care. I was also involved in developing international health programs of BRAC specifically for Pakistan. In 2007 I joined icddr,b an international research organization based in Bangladesh. The first couple of years of my tenure at icddr,b, I was providing technical assistance to the Government of Bangladesh for outbreak investigations. I was also involved in conducting and facilitating different training workshops for Government health professionals at different levels, developing health policy documents and actively took part in developing the national hospital-based communicable disease surveillance system. In 2009, I took the lead of two of major surveillance projects for childhood respiratory illness. I was responsible for designing, implementation and overall supervising of the projects, analysing the data , dissemination of the results and drafting of the manuscripts.

My PhD research was focused on estimating the burden of childhood severe respiratory diseases and identifying risk factors at a population level using linked "big-data". The data generated provided comprehensive burden of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) diseases in children of Australia including the burden of hospitalization and economic burden. I also conducted a prospective study into the risk of preterm infants acquiring nosocomial RSV infection in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) during their birth hospitalization. This was the first time a study has been done in Australia which has documented the prevalence of RSV and potential sources of nosocomial RSV transmission within NICU in the absence of an outbreak.

I am currently working on several translational projects which are investigating the association between respiratory viral infections in early childhood and the subsequent risk of chronic respiratory morbidity and the variation in care for children with common lung diseases of childhood. I am also leading implementation evaluation projects investigating community-based effective models of care for the management of childhood asthma in underserved areas of NSW.

My Research Supervision

Supervision keywords

childhood asthma prevention study team

Areas of supervision

Childhood infectious diseases

Childhood viral respiratory illness

Childhood Asthma

Currently supervising

4 Honours students

4 PhD Students ( Primary supervisor)

My Engagement

2024-ongoing: Research sub-committee member ,The Thoracic society of Australia New Zealand

2023-ogoing: Lung health Faculty, The Thoracic society of Australia New Zealand

2022-ongoing: Elected Council Member, International Society for Influenza and other Respiratory viruses

2022-ongoing: Member Scientific Advisory Group Infection, Inflammation and Immunity Theme (Triple I) Stream of Sydney Partnership for Health, Education, Research and Enterprise (SPHERE)

2021-ongoing: Expert member of the PROUD (Preventing RespiratOry syncytial virUs (RSV) in unDerdeveloped countries) Taskforce

2020-ongoing: Member of International Society for Social Pediatrics and Child Health

2017-ongoing: Member, The Thoracic society of Australia New Zealand

2017-ongoing: Member, The Lung Foundation Australia

2014-ongoing: RSV Global Estimates Network (RSV GEN)

My Teaching

2020-0ngoing: Course coordinator, Epidemiology course of the Master of Public Health program at James P. Grant School of Public Health, BRAC University, Bangladesh

2017-ongoing: Global Child Health, Phase 2 undergraduate medicine program

2016-ongoing: Visiting lecturer, Tropical Disease Control at School of Public Health and Community Medicine, UNSW Australia.

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