Dr. Rodrigo Rizzo is a Medical Research Future Funding (MRFF) Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Neuroscience Research Australia (NeuRA) and the School of Health Sciences, University of New South Wales (UNSW). Dr. Rizzo worked as a physiotherapist and clinical hypnotherapist to help people with chronic pain for almost 20 years.
Dr. Rizzo is interested in implementing evidence-based practice in primary care and developing or optimising new...view more
Dr. Rodrigo Rizzo is a Medical Research Future Funding (MRFF) Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Neuroscience Research Australia (NeuRA) and the School of Health Sciences, University of New South Wales (UNSW). Dr. Rizzo worked as a physiotherapist and clinical hypnotherapist to help people with chronic pain for almost 20 years.
Dr. Rizzo is interested in implementing evidence-based practice in primary care and developing or optimising new non-pharmacological interventions to manage chronic pain, particularly back pain. Dr. Rizzo is using cutting-edge digital technologies, including artificial intelligence and mobile applications, to close the evidence-to-practice gap.
Dr. Rizzo has conducted randomised controlled trials and undertaken process evaluations (e.g., mediation analysis and qualitative analysis) of non-pharmacological interventions for chronic low back pain. He pioneered the combination of hypnotic suggestions as an experiential component for the management of chronic back pain. Dr. Rizzo's innovative approach has been applied to several allied health teams to manage chronic pain, including the Prince of Wales Hospital, St. George's Hospital, and St. Vincent's Hospital in Australia. Dr. Rizzo has established successful industry-academic partnerships to translate evidence into practice and improve the management of pain in primary care.
My Grants
NHMRC Centre for Research Excellence, 2023, Australia, New Zealand Back Pain (ANZBACK) Research Network Seeding Grant. A$ 20,000. Chief Investigator. Project: Aid-Back Development: a co-creation of an artificial intelligence chatbot for shared decision-making to improve the management of low back pain in primary care.
SPHERE Musculoskeletal Academic Group (MUSC CAG) Seeding Grant, 2023, Australia. A$ 40,000. Chief Investigator. Project: Aid-Back Feasibility: the feasibility of integrating an artificial intelligence chatbot for shared decision-making to improve the management of low back pain in primary care.
Medical Research Future Funding (MRFF): Primary Health Care Digital Innovations. 2021 (start date: 2023). A$1.6M. Chief Investigator. Project: The NOTUS trial (NOn-pharmacological Treatment for chronic low back pain USing digital health technology).
My Research Activities
Supporting evidence-based decision-making for musculoskeletal pain: The project involves systematic reviews of tools and technologies to support decision-making in primary care, qualitative research to understand patients' and clinicians' views about decision-making tools, co-creation of decision-making tools (e.g., AID-Back: an artificial intelligence chatbot to facilitate decision-making), and evaluation and integration of these interventions into the primary care workflow.
NOn-pharmacological Treatments USing digital health for musculoskeletal pain (The NOTUS Project): Using evidence from high-quality clinical trials and mechanism evaluations (e.g., mediation analysis and qualitative research), the NOTUS project aims to develop, evaluate, and implement non-pharmacological interventions (e.g., pain education combined with clinical hypnosis and behaviour change techniques) delivered via digital technologies for the management of pain.
We have PhD scholarship opportunities and projects for honours students. Keep in touch!
My Research Supervision
Supervision keywords
Areas of supervision
- Communication tools to improve the management of musculoskeletal pain (e.g., decision aids, shared decision-making, patient education)
- Digital health solutions to improve the management of musculoskeletal pain in primary care.
- Process evaluations (e.g., qualitative and quantitative research) alongside clinical trials.
Currently supervising
Honours Students:
- Avi Goodman
- Isha Mishra
- Maija Tan
- Mia Ryan
PhD Students: recruiting
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9624-6210