Emma Thomas

Emma is a Research Fellow, NHMRC Emerging Leader and prior Heart Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow within the Centre for Online Health (Centre for Health Services Research) at the University of Queensland. She provides input into a range of telehealth projects across the centre. She has a particular interest in using telehealth within the care and management of people with cardiovascular disease and other chronic diseases to enhance self-management and reduce barriers to access. Underpinning her work more broadly is an interest in scaling-up effective interventions, monitoring the quality of their delivery and ensuring equitable provision of health services.

Emma completed her PhD (2019) at the University of Melbourne in the School of Population and Global Health as an NHMRC Postgraduate Scholar. Her thesis aimed to understand how the evidence-practice gap in cardiac rehabilitation can be reduced in Australian through enhanced monitoring and evaluation. Emma has also worked across various other research groups including at the University of Oxford at a WHO Collaborating Centre focused on population approaches for non-communicable disease prevention, the Non-Communicable Disease Unit at the University of Melbourne, and a Centre of Research Excellence in Aphasia Rehabilitation (University of Queensland). She has also worked for the Heart Foundation as an academic advisor and also a senior project manager.

Emma has a strong interest in implementation science and sits on the Editorial Board for the journal Implementation Science Communications. She is also part of the Emerging Leaders Committee for the Australian Cardiovascular Alliance (ACvA), and a committee member of the Australian Cardiovascular health and Rehabilitation Association (QLD branch).