Dr Bridget Abell

Biography

Bridget initially qualified with an undergraduate degree in Exercise Science from the University of Queensland and spent 7 years working clinically as a Cardiac Physiologist in the diagnosis and treatment of heart disease across the private and public health care sectors in Australia and the United Kingdom. Since then she has also developed a strong skill set in health and medical research having completed a Master’s Degree in Clinical Epidemiology at University College London, and having worked for several years as a research assistant across a variety of health disciplines.  Most recently she has been able to combine her professional experience with her passion for research, having completed her PhD examining exercise-based cardiac rehabilitation with the Centre for Research in Evidence-Based Practice at Bond University. She now has expanded her scope of interest to join AusHSI as a Research Fellow in Health Services Research and Implementation Science.

 

Research Interests and HDR Supervision

My research interests fall into three broad categories:

1.          Evidence-based practice

Given my clinical background and experience I really enjoy conducting projects which aim to better translate research evidence into clinical practice. This part of my research is often methodological in approach and broadly applicable across many disciplines - for example, improving the reporting of exercise interventions so that they are able to be used in practice, or exploring the nature and quality of clinical guidelines. I have also more recently taken an interest in health services research which aims to highlight evidence to inform policy and practice, as well as improve the cost and accessibility of healthcare.

Examples of research:

• Abell, Bridget, Glasziou, Paul, & Hoffmann, Tammy (2017) Exploration of the methodological quality and clinical usefulness of a cross-sectional sample of published guidance about exercise training and physical activity for the secondary prevention of coronary heart disease. BMC Cardiovascular Disorders, 17(1).
• Abell, Bridget, Glasziou, Paul, & Hoffmann, Tammy (2015) Reporting and replicating trials of exercise-based cardiac rehabilitation: Do we know what the researchers actually did?Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes, 8(2), pp. 187-194.

2.       Exercise training for the secondary prevention of cardiovascular disease

My research in this area has been more directly focused on the clinical application of exercise training and its outcomes for patients with coronary heart disease.  It has involved evaluating the effectiveness of exercise components via meta-regression, and conducting a survey of current clinical practices.

Examples of research:

• Abell, Bridget, Glasziou, Paul, Briffa, Tom, & Hoffmann, Tammy (2016) Exercise training characteristics in cardiac rehabilitation programmes: A cross-sectional survey of Australian practice. Open Heart, 3(1), Article number-e000374.
• Abell, Bridget, Glasziou, Paul, & Hoffmann, Tammy (2017) The contribution of individual exercise training components to clinical outcomes in randomised controlled trials of cardiac rehabilitation: A systematic review and meta-regression. Sports Medicine - Open, 3(1).

2.       Implementation Science in health

Implementation science refers to “the scientific study of methods to promote the systematic uptake of research findings and other EBPs into routine practice, and, hence, to improve the quality and effectiveness of health services.” This type of research uses qualitative and quantitative methods to plan, implement and evaluate health service change.

While I have the greatest skills, knowledge and interest in these three areas, I am more than happy to supervise HDR research projects that relate to any of these areas of research practice e.g exercise training for other chronic diseases, evidence-based practice in other fields.