Christina Aggar

Biography

Christina is a registered nurse and an expert on ageing, family carers and caregiving, and health services research. Christina holds a conjoint research academic appointment at Northern NSW Local Health District, leading the strategic development of patient care and health services research across 12 hospitals. Christina is the Principal Investigator on a successful NHMRC Partnership Grant, and a Chief Investigator on two major NHMRC Category 1 grants focused on enhancing emergency nursing care across Australia.

Research

Christina is a leading international researcher on building capacity and capability among family carers of older people with complex chronic disease, and social prescribing programs. Christina has a proven track record in supporting healthcare professionals to conduct and translate research into practice, resulting in high-quality accessible services that support better health outcomes. With a national and international research profile, she has authored over 100 peer-reviewed articles, government submissions, and reports. Christina has secured over $7 million in research funding, including $4.9 million in the last 5 years. Christina's research has also supported significant recommendations and frameworks, such as the Productivity Commission Inquiry "Caring for Older Australians" and the National Carer Recognition Framework.

Christina established and is co-lead of the FoH’s new research theme: Resilient Ageing in Supportive Environments (RAISE) and a member of the CCC Cluster. RAISE brings together researchers, international collaborators, industry partners, and those with lived experience to tackle challenges related to ageing and caregiving.

Supervision

Christina currently supports 9 HDR students, 5 as primary supervisor. She encourages students, early career researchers and clinicians to publish early.

Teaching

Christina has extensive teaching, and curriculum review and development experience in undergraduate and postgraduate programs including, the first Australian: Primary Health Care Transition program for new graduate nurses, Community Health Care Transition program for new graduate nurses, Masters Primary Health Care program, and Postgraduate program for internationally qualified nurses seeking Australian registration.

Christina works closely with SCU’s International Office and overseas partners to successfully secure DFAT New Colombo Plan (NCP) Grants, delivering global work-integrated learning (WIL) opportunities. To date, 40 students have participated in primary healthcare placements in Belagavi, India.

Other

Christina's work with international nurses and undergraduate programs continues to grow. The establishment of several key collaborations have resulted in sustainable and ongoing curricula research nexus, including a digital mobile program to support nurses' leadership skills in primary health care and chronic illness management at several universities in India.