Associate Professor Angela Campbell and Professor Alister Neill, of Otago’s Wellington-based WellSleep Centre, were recognised at the recent Australasian Sleep Association conference.
Two academic staff from the Wellington campus’s WellSleep Centre, Professor Alister Neill and Associate Professor Angela Campbell, have had their work recognised at the Australasian Sleep Association conference held on the Gold Coast in October.
Professor Neill, the Clinical Director of the Centre, was presented with the Australasian Sleep Association’s Distinguished Achievement Award, while Associate Professor Campbell received the Australia and New Zealand Sleep Science Association’s President’s Award.
The President of the Australasian Sleep Association, Professor Garun Hamilton, says Alister has been helping to shape New Zealand sleep medicine for more than 25 years across all areas, from clinical sleep medicine to sleep disorder advocacy, teaching and research.
Alister graduated with an MB ChB from Otago in 1985 and went on to train as a respiratory and sleep physician. He completed a sleep medicine fellowship in Adelaide before returning to New Zealand in 1997 to lead WellSleep, which remains the only academic clinical sleep research-orientated laboratory in the country.
Professor Hamilton said Alister had overseen National Association of Testing Authorities, Australia (NATA) accreditation of the laboratory, making it the first in New Zealand to achieve this, and was a leader in chronic home ventilation services for patients with respiratory failure.
“With respect to sleep advocacy, his impact has been enormous. He has advocated tirelessly with all levels of government for increased recognition of sleep disorders, and most notably has been a passionate advocate for equitable access to sleep services.”
As well as providing regular teaching for medical students and junior doctors at all levels, Alister has overseen multiple sleep medicine advanced trainees and provided regular education sessions on sleep medicine for GPs and nurses.
He has published well over 50 peer-reviewed papers, with his areas of research interest including improving treatment outcomes for patients with obstructive sleep apnoea (OSA), the relationship between OSA and cardiovascular disease, ethnic differences in sleep apnoea and improving the provision of home ventilation for respiratory failure in New Zealand.
Alister has served on the board of the Australasian Sleep Association (ASA) and was the inaugural President of the New Zealand Sleep Health Foundation. He also contributed to ASA clinical guidelines, including those for the performance of polysomnography.
Associate Professor Angela Campbell, the Laboratory Manager at WellSleep, was honoured at the same event for her outstanding contributions to the Australia and New Zealand Sleep Science Association (ANZSSA).
ANZSSA President Nicole Verginis said Associate Professor Campbell’s world-class research and leadership had helped promote sleep physiology as a profession.
“[She] is a great advocate for our field, supporting and educating the next generation of physiologists.”
Angela completed her PhD in infant sleep physiology at Otago in 1997.
Her expertise and research interests span both adult and paediatric sleep, covering innovations in diagnostic testing and treatment for sleep apnoea. She has also explored obstructive sleep apnoea prevalence, ethnic differences in access to care, patient outcomes and paediatric sleep apnoea.
On a day-to-day basis, she manages the clinical sleep laboratory at WellSleep, and teaches sleep medicine and technology to medical students, and those wishing to train as clinical physiologists.
She was a key driver in the establishment of the New Zealand Sleep Certification Examination in 2017, as well as with the ANZSSA Sleep Science Certification exam, held for the first time in March.
The WellSleep Centre was set up in 1997 as a result of a collaboration between the University of Otago, Capital and Coast Health, Bowen Hospital Trust and TranzRail, which recognised the potentially serious impact that sleep deprivation and sleep apnoea could have on train drivers.
It is based at Bowen Hospital in Wellington.