Staff profile

Dr Sophie Hill

Head, Centre for Health Communication and Particip, Co-ordinating Editor, Cochrane Consumers and Commu

Faculty of Health Sciences

School of Nursing and Midwifery Centre for Health Communication and Participation

Melbourne (Bundoora)

 

Qualifications

PhD La Trobe, MA La Trobe, BA (Hons) UMelb.

Area of study

Public Health

Brief Profile

Sophie Hill is the Head of the Centre for Health Communication and Participation, at La Trobe University, a centre she has established from the foundation of the Cochrane Consumers and Communication Review Group. The Centre has an applied focus, with three roles: coordinating the production and publication of evidence on interventions to communicate with people about health; innovative research on communication issues that have been neglected, such as multimorbidity; and a knowledge translation function, for getting evidence into practice and policy.  

As Co-ordinating Editor of the Review Group, she is responsible for academic leadership internationally in the areas of evidence-based health communication and participation.  In 2011, her book The Knowledgeable Patient will be released by Wiley Blackwell, summarising much of the developmental research she has completed at the helm of the Cochrane Consumers and Communication Review Group.   She is active in consumer participation policy circles, being a member of Victoria’s Consumer Participation Reference Committee for the implementation of the policy ‘Doing it with us not for us’ for the Victorian Department of Human Service from 2006 to date.   

Dr Hill is active at senior levels of The Cochrane Collaboration where she is an elected and appointed member of senior committees.   

Dr Hill is Senior Research Fellow at La Trobe University and the Subject Coordinator for Evidence-based Public Health in the Masters in Public Health. Here she teaches the fundamentals of evidence-based concepts and practice to health service professionals working in community and hospital settings. Her work on supporting rigorous research is reflected in a grant from the Department of Health to the Centre for Health Communication and Participation for Evaluating the Effectiveness of Consumer Participation, where the Centre staff provide research support to health service personnel.  

Prior to joining La Trobe University, Dr Hill undertook consultancies for consumer groups and government on researching on patient experiences. From 1987 to 1992 she worked at the Health Issues Centre, a community-based consumer group, leading it from 1990-92.

Research interests

Consumer participation

- Health literacy

Teaching Units

PHE5/6EBP: Evidence-based Public Health

Recent Publications

 

Ryan R, Santesso N, Hill S, Lowe D, Kaufman C, Grimshaw J. Consumer-oriented interventions for evidence-based prescribing and medicines use: an overview of systematic reviews. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2011, Issue 5. Art. No.: CD007768. DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD007768.pub2.   Ryan R,

Hill S, Lowe D, Allen K, Taylor M, Mead C. Notification and support for people exposed to the risk of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) (or other prion diseases) through medical treatment (iatrogenically). Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2011, Issue 3. Art. No.: CD007578. DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD007578.pub2.  

Weir M, Ryan R, Mayhew A, Worswick J, Santesso N, Lowe D, Leslie B, Stevens A, Hill S, Grimshaw J. The Rx for Change Database: A first-in-class tool for optimal prescribing and medicines use Implementation Science 2010, 5:89 doi:10.1186/1748-5908-5-89.  

Lowe D, Ryan R, Santesso N, Hill S. (2010) Development of a taxonomy of interventions to organise the evidence on consumers' medicines use, Patient Education and Counseling DOI: 10.1016/j.pec.2010.09.024.  

Glasziou P, Chalmers I, Altman DG, Bastian H, Boutron I, Brice A, Jamtvedt G, Farmer A, Ghersi D, Groves T, Heneghan C, Hill S, Lewin S, Michie S, Perera R, Pomeroy V, Tilson J, Shepperd S, Williams JW. Taking healthcare interventions from trial to practice. BMJ 2010;341:c3852.  

Hill S. 2009. Editorial. Directions in Health Communication. Bulletin of the World Health Organization ;87:648-648. doi: 10.2471/BLT.09.070680.

Ryan R, Prictor M, McLaughlin KJ, Hill S. Audio-visual presentation of information for informed consent for participation in clinical trials. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2008, Issue 1. Art. No.: CD003717. DOI: 0.1002/14651858.CD003717.pub2.

Ryan R, Kaufman C and Hill SJ. Building blocks for meta-synthesis: data integration tables for summarising, mapping, and synthesising evidence on interventions for communicating with health consumers. BMC Medical Research Methodology 2009, 9:16 doi:10.1186/1471-2288-9-16.

Ryan R, Hill S. 2009. Multimorbidity decision burden for medicines not recognised. Letter, BMJ, 19 August 2009.

Hill S, Spink J, Cadilhac D, Edwards A, Kaufman C, Rogers S, Ryan R, Tonkin A. Absolute risk representation in cardiovascular disease prevention: comprehension and preferences of health care consumers and general practitioners involved in a focus group study. BMC Public Health 2010, 10:108 doi:10.1186/1471-2458-10-108.

Presentations

Dilkes H, Hill S, Ryan R. Evidence for improving communication and participation: evaluation of Evidence Bulletin knowledge transfer. Poster presentation. 16th Cochrane Colloquium, 3-7 October 2008, Freiburg, Germany.

Ryan R, Lowe D, Prictor M, Hill S. Two reviews are better than one? Developing linkages between a qualitative review of methodologically-diverse studies, and a Cochrane intervention review. Poster presentation. 16th Cochrane Colloquium, 3-7 October 2008, Freiburg, Germany.

Santesso N, Rosenbaum S, Strømme Nilsen E, Rader T, Pardo J, Ciapponi A, Hill S, Ryan R, Dilkes H. Development and evaluation of a format for Plain Language Summaries. 16th Cochrane Colloquium. Freiburg, Germany. October 4, 2008.

Prictor M, Hill S, Ryan R. Tools and resources for reviews of complex interventions: a workshop by the Consumers and Communication Review Group. Workshop. 16th Cochrane Colloquium. Freiburg, Germany. October 2008.

Hill S, Ryan R. Reviewing the evidence on notifying and supporting people at risk of CJD acquired through medical procedures, Presentation to the CJD Support Group Network Conference May 16 2008.

Ryan R, Hill S, Lowe D. Developing an evidence-based framework for notifying and supporting people at risk of CJD acquired medically. Presentation to the CJD Support Group Network Conference May 16 2009.

Ryan R, Hill S. Effective health communication – the challenge of multimorbidity. Invited paper presented by R Ryan, Arthritis Victoria Roundtable, August 3 2009, Melbourne.

Ryan R, Lowe D, Santesso N, Hill S. Development of a taxonomy of interventions directed at consumers to promote evidence-based prescribing and medicines use: a tool for evidence-based decision-making (Poster session 3: Safe and effective use). Presented at: National Medicines Symposium 26-28 May 2010, Melbourne.

Lowe D, Ryan R, Santesso N, Hill S, Grimshaw J. Assembling, evaluating and presenting the evidence on interventions directed to consumers to improve medicines use (Poster session 4: Sustainability). Presented at: National Medicines Symposium 26-28 May 2010, Melbourne.

Ryan R and Hill S. Multimorbidity and communication with consumers. Invited paper presented by R Ryan, National Medicines Symposium 26-28 May 2010, Melbourne.

 

Research projects

 

Lewin S, Hill S, Hussey G, Lin V, Robinson P, Mittelmark M. ‘Communicate to vaccinate’ (COMMVAC): Building evidence for improving communication about childhood vaccinations in low- and middle-income countries.  Global Health and Vaccination Research (GLOBVAC). Research Council of Norway. 2010-2012.  

Hill S, Filippini G, Osborne R, Summers M, Multiple Sclerosis Australia National Services Leadership Group (S. Shapland signatory). 00025. Integrating and deriving evidence, experiences and preferences (IN-DEEP): developing research-based health information applicable to decision making and self-management by people with multiple sclerosis. MS Research Australia Grant Application 00025. (2010-12).