Accolade for HSCU Deputy Head Dr Briony Hill

Congratulations to Dr Briony Hill, Health and Social Care Unit (HSCU) Deputy Head, who was recently promoted to Level C.

At six years post-PhD after accounting for career disruptions, Dr Hill’s research specialises in maternal wellbeing – in particular using a social and environmental approach to understanding more about wellbeing, obesity prevention, and diet and physical activity practices before, during and after pregnancy. She is also one of only a small handful of researchers globally, pursuing research to understand how we can eliminate weight stigma to reduce the burden and blame on women across the reproductive phase of life.

An Australian Research Council Discovery Early Career Research Award Fellow (ARC DECRA Fellow), Dr Hill has previously completed a National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Early Career Fellowship and also has a current Australian Research Council Discovery Project grant.

Dr Hill is also the founding Chair and current Co-Chair of the Australian Health in Preconception, Pregnancy and Postpartum Early and Mid-career Researcher Collective (HiPPP EMR-C), which aims to unite researchers specialising in this field to meet the dual needs of collective action in maternal obesity prevention and capacity building in PhD students and early and mid-career researchers.

“Briony has worked extraordinarily hard and is such an inspiration,” HSCU Head, Professor Helen Skouteris said. “The epitome of hard work paying off. She is also perhaps the first researcher globally to begin exploring weight stigma in preconception women and is to be commended for her perseverance and passion for improving the health and wellbeing of women in the reproductive years.”

Dr Hill said her accolade “feels like the culmination of many years of hard work that has produced outputs that I am extremely proud of.”

Dr Hill said she also placed great value on her role as a supervisor for PhD students.

“I love what I do and in particular, working with my PhD students and seeing their growth and development as researchers,” Dr Hill said. “I gain great satisfaction and learn so much from working with them, too.”

Among Dr Hill’s career highlights, is the sole author paper she published in Obesity Reviews – the top journal of her field – in 2020: Expanding our understanding and use of the ecological systems theory model for the prevention of maternal obesity: A new socioecological framework.

With several big projects focussed on weight stigma underway, Dr Hill said she was eager to see the outputs of her work make a difference for women in the future.

“Privileging the voices of women, I’m keen see changes in the way society talks about women in larger bodies. We are also working towards developing more thoughtful policies and healthcare practices to ultimately improve health and wellbeing outcomes for women and their families.”

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