Deborah is a clinician researcher and Professor of Practice with the Cancer Elimination Collaboration (CEC) and at Sydney Medical School at The University of Sydney. She is Chair of the National Cervical Screening Program Clinical Advisory Group and has contributed to national policy and guideline development, serving on the National Cervical Screening Guidelines and Cervical Cancer Treatment Guidelines Working Groups, as well as Cancer Council Australia’s Optimal Care Pathways initiatives for people with disability and for LGBTIQA+ communities.
Deborah leads a national program of work to improve equitable cervical screening participation for people with disability. She is Chief Investigator (CI) A on the NHMRC-funded Targeted Cancer Research project, ScreenEQUAL, which aims to optimise cervical screening participation with and for people with intellectual disability. She also leads the Department of Health, Disability and Ageing-funded project Enhancing Equity in Cervical Screening, a three-year initiative that is piloting a Lived Experience Cervical Screening Advocates Program and co-designing an online training program for the disability sector. Deborah is a CI in the C4 Centre of Research Excellence in Cervical Cancer Control and Deputy Lead of the Elimination Partnership in Cervical Cancer, a major implementation program supported by the Australian Government and Minderoo Foundation. In recognition of her contributions, she was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) in 2023 for significant service to medicine and reproductive health, and received the 2024 Jeannie Ferris Cancer Australia Recognition Award for exceptional leadership and achievements in cancer prevention and education.
