Holland - Respiratory Care group

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Key terms

Research aims

Our research aims to improve the lives of people with chronic lung disease through novel non-drug treatments and optimal supportive care.

The group

Group leader

2025 Respiratory Care Group and Chronic Respiratory Disease Group L-R - Back row: Sebastian Moreno, Shohei Kawachi, Arwel Jones, Sarah Rawlings, Janet Bondarenko, Angela Burge, Cassidy Du Berry, Anthony May, Gabriella Tikellis, Christie Mellerick, Adelle Gadowski. Front row: Yet Khor, Narelle Cox, Sanduni Madawala, Angela Wan, Anne Holland, Simone Dal Corso, Mariana Hoffman, Catherine Buchan, Amy Pascoe, Rebecca Disler
Associate Professors
Research Fellows
- Dr Angela Burge
- Dr Angela Wan
- Dr Anthony May
- Dr Apinya Koontalay
- Dr Arwel Jones
- Dr Cassidy Du Berry
- Dr Gabriella Tikellis
- Dr Leona Dowman
- Dr Mariana Hoffman
- Dr Simone Dal Corso
Research Officers
- Christie Mellerick
- Eleanor Raper
- Emma Marshall
- Janet Bondarenko
- Jean Bremner
- Kate Banks
- Rebecca Cousins
- Sarah Rawlings
PhD students
- Christie Mellerick
- Eleanor Raper
- Janet Bondarenko
- Kristen Andrews
- Sarah Rawlings
- Dr Sheetal Deshpande
- Dr Shivonne Prasad
- Tegan Ilsey
Masters Students
- Meg Poulsen
Honours Students
- Emma Marshall
- Adam Giannellis
Research students
In 2025, there are 8 PhD students, 1 Master student, and 2 Honours students undertaking clinical research projects within the Respiratory Care Research team.
Associated group
- Chronic Respiratory Disease group, Department of Immunology - led by Prof Natasha Smallwood.

Contact details

T: (03) 99030214 | E. Anne.holland@monash.edu
Respiratory Research@Alfred
Monash University
Level 6, The Alfred Centre
99 Commercial Road
Melbourne Victoria 3004
Australia

Research overview

Our work starts with understanding the supportive care needs of people living with lung disease, developing new non-drug treatments, testing these in clinical trials, and then implementing effective treatments into clinical practice. We have a strong focus on pulmonary rehabilitation for people with chronic lung disease. This includes developing new pulmonary rehabilitation models to improve access and uptake (e.g. low-cost home-based rehabilitation and telerehabilitation) and optimising pulmonary rehabilitation for patients with complex needs, such as those with pulmonary fibrosis. Our research builds the evidence underpinning a wide range of non-drug treatments for chronic lung disease including oxygen therapy, self-management, and peer support. We have strong links to the Department of Physiotherapy and Department of Respiratory Medicine at Alfred Health, providing valuable opportunities to embed research into clinical practice.

Our team has produced two, freely available, web-based resources to support clinicians to deliver new models of pulmonary rehabilitation. Check them out here:

Research opportunities for students

Are you ready to join a dynamic academic community focused on innovative healthcare research? Contact us today to discover how we can support your research journey! Located at the Alfred Centre, we have strong ties and collaborations with Alfred Health and actively undertake healthcare research aimed at improving short-term and long-term patient outcomes. Our experienced supervisors come from diverse backgrounds and specialise in respiratory physiology, exercise science, epidemiology, and implementation science.

Currently, we have various projects suitable for honours, MSc or PhD level research that relate to the analysis of established healthcare datasets, prospective participant-facing data collection and the conduct of systematic reviews and meta-analyses. Findings from many of our studies go on to inform clinical management guidelines. With a focus on chronic lung disease and non-pharmacological interventions, our research encompasses a wide range of respiratory and sleep medicine topics, including (but not limited to):

Physiological response to exercise
Improving equitable access to rehabilitation care
The role of gender in telehealth and pulmonary rehabilitation attitude and uptake
Remote healthcare monitoring
Measurement device and questionnaire validation
Discerning minimal clinically important change scores

Explore our current projects and meet our supervisors by clicking below to learn more.

Narelle Cox Anne Holland Arwel Jones

Current projects

This a four-year project funded by the Medical Research Future Fund. The project involves a clinical trial (the TAPPET trial) led by Dr Arwel Jones, with the support of Prof Anne Holland, Assoc Prof Narelle Cox, Dr Angela Burge and Dr Angela Wan. The TAPPET trial is testing the implementation of a treatable traits approach that identifies people with asthma, bronchiectasis or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease at high risk of hospitalisation, and targets a personalised, safe, low-cost model of home pulmonary rehabilitation and self-management. For enquiries, please contact Dr Arwel Jones at arwel.jones@monash.edu.
See protocol
Multimorbidity affects 4.9 million Australians and is linked to poor quality of life, higher hospital admissions, and limited access to suitable rehabilitation. The PERFORM Trial, led by Professor Anne Holland, will evaluate a newly co-designed exercise and self-management program tailored for people with multiple chronic conditions. Our team includes Dr Simone Dal Corso (Trial Coordinator), Professor Natasha Lannin (Implementation Lead), Dr Angela Wang (Qualitative Lead), and Professors Sally Singh and Prof Rod Taylor (UK Chief Investigators). Launched in 2024, the trial will recruit over 2,000 participants across 9 Australian sites (funded by the Medical Research Future Fund) and 12 UK sites (funded by NIHR). For enquiries, please contact Prof Anne Holland at anne.holland@monash.edu.
Led by Prof Anne Holland and funded by the Medical Research Future Fund, this project focuses on implementation of home-based rehabilitation to reduce hospital admissions in Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) patients. Our team includes Dr Arwel Jones (trial coordinator), Dr Narelle Cox (implementation lead), and Sarah Rawlings (qualitative lead). This project initiated on June 1, 2019, is being conducted at 14 sites across Australia. For enquiries, please contact Prof. Anne Holland at anne.holland@monash.edu.
See protocol HERE.
This project is funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) and led by Dr. Narelle Cox, with the support of Prof Anne Holland, Dr Angela Burge and Dr Anthony May (trial co-ordinator). This project initiated on January 1, 2019, will test our model of home-based pulmonary rehabilitation (Home Base) delivered in the first 2 weeks after hospital admission in people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. For enquiries, please contact Dr Anthony May at anthony.may@monash.edu.
See protocol HERE.

Consumer engagement

Our researchers recognises the value and importance of partnering with the community to develop and deliver relevant and impactful research. We are committed to engaging with the community to be actively involved with our team of researchers to work together to plan, deliver and communicate our research. Find out more about our Community Advisory Group.

Success stories and awards

See Respiratory Research@Alfred success stories in the Faculty news page and School of Translational Medicine news blog.

A/Prof Narelle Cox and team have been awarded a $2.49million Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF) Chronic Respiratory Conditions funding grant. The R2EACH project will target improving access to effective non-pharmacological care for people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in 12 rural health services across five states. Find out more
Congratulations to Professor Anne Holland and researchers from the Respiratory Research@Alfred team — Gabriella Tikellis, Narelle Cox, Leona Dowman, Angela Burge and Janet Bondarenko — on being awarded a $688,339 NSW iCARE Dust Diseases Board Research Grant.
The project, “Implementation of telerehabilitation for silicosis: improving access to best care” will focus on developing a telerehabilitation program tailored specifically for people living with silicosis. This innovative approach aims to address the gaps in care identified by people with silicosis and will evaluate the effectiveness of such a program on health-related quality of life measures.
Congratulations to Prof Anne Holland on her recent NHMRC Leadership Investigator Grant (2026-2030) for her project ‘Advancing non-drug treatments to improve lung health’. Over 7 million Australians live with a chronic lung condition, characterised by distressing breathlessness, poor physical function and frequent hospital admissions. The aim of this research program is to reduce the burden of chronic lung disease using highly effective non-drug treatments - exercise-based rehabilitation, oxygen therapy and self-management. This program of research will focus on developing, testing and personalising non-drug treatments, and driving excellence in healthcare delivery.
Dr Angela Burge has been awarded the 2025 American Thoracic Society Assembly on Pulmonary Rehabilitation Early Career Research Achievement Award for her scientific contributions to pulmonary rehabilitation and society activities. In addition, Angela has received the 2025 Thoracic Society of Australia and New Zealand Past Presidents Scholarship Award for scientific quality and innovation, combined with her track record and potential for impact in the field of respiratory health.
Congratulations Dr Arwel Jones for being one of the 2024 TSANZ Respiratory Research Excellence award winners at the 2024 Thoracic Society of Australia and New Zealand (TSANZ) Annual Scientific Conference on the Gold Coast. Arwel received a Moderna Research Award for Lung Health – Immunisation, providing $50,000 for his proposal ‘Exercise as an adjuvant to vaccination in COPD’. This study will assess the feasibility and safety of using vaccines for respiratory viruses to test exercise-induced changes in immune function in COPD.
Congratulations Dr Arwel Jones for receiving 2024 INvesting in NOVel Academic Training Excellence (INNOVATE) funding from the NHMRC Centre of Excellence in Treatable Traits. INNOVATE awards are intended to provide seed funding for early to mid-career researchers. Arwel has been awarded $20,000 for his project entitled ‘Development of patient decision aids to inform oral corticosteroid use in asthma and COPD’.

Department of Respiratory Research@Alfred

Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences

Holland - Respiratory Care group

Page contents

Key terms

Research aims

The group

Group leader

Research overview

Research opportunities for students

Current projects

Consumer engagement

Success stories and awards

Recent publications

Holland - Respiratory Care group

Page contents

Remote rehab trial transforms respiratory disease treatment

Key terms

Research aims

The group

Group leader

Research overview

Research opportunities for students

Current projects

Consumer engagement

Success stories and awards

Recent publications