RMSANZ Board of Directors

The current board of directors as of the AGM held in 2024

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Prof Steven Faux AM

President

Professor Steven Faux was the establishing Director of the St Vincent’s Hospital’s Department of Rehabilitation Medicine in 2000 and is the current director of Pain Medicine at St Vincent’s Hospital, Sydney. He is a Conjoint Professor of Medicine at the University of NSW and the University of Notre Dame. Professor Faux has led NSW Health’s rehabilitation Community of Practice in COVID19. He is on the management committee of the Australian Stroke Registry, the Clinical Council of the National Stroke Foundation and is a graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors. He has served on the board of the RMSANZ for over 4 years, and is the scientific lead of the ISPRM Congress in Sydney 2024

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Dr Josephine Braid

Board Member

Dr Josephine Braid has been practicing as a Rehabilitation Physician since 2009 and has expertise in neuro-rehabilitation in particular brain injury rehabilitation. She resides in Orange, NSW with her family and works in Bathurst Health Service. She regularly  facilitates Schwartz Rounds there. Jo is also a certified leadership coach and has a focus on clinician wellbeing strategies at the individual, team and organisation level. When not working, Jo enjoys travelling and a hit of tennis any day.

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Dr Kellie Nichol

Board Member

Dr Nichol is a descendant of Ngāi Tahu and resides in Dunedin, New Zealand. She is a  Rehabilitation Medicine Physician, employed by Health NZ – Southern. Kellie has a special interest in neurorehabilitation, in particular acquired brain injuries.

She has been an AFRM fellow since 2013, holding several AFRM and RMSANZ committee memberships. Currently, I am a member of AFRM Aotearoa committee, Aotearoa representative on the Faculty Education Committee and previously the Aotearoa representative on the Faculty Training committee. Kellie is also the co-chair of RMSANZ Aotearoa branch, RMSANZ Advisory Council member and co-convener of RMSANZ 8th Annual scientific meeting held in conjunction with New Zealand Rehabilitation Association in 2025.

Outside of medicine, my husband and I own and operate a farming business and were th 3 2023 national ambassadors for sustainable farming and growing in Aotearoa.

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Dr Ben Chen

Treasurer

Receiving his FAFRM in 2007, he started in Gold Coast Health as a staff specialist in rehabilitation at the time of unprecedented (and continuing) growth and service demands.

Being somewhat accommodating in nature, he has both unwittingly and deliberately been implicated in various attempts to make the system better, some more successful than others. These included the commissioning and decommissioning of a stand-alone rehabilitation and interim care facility (Carrara Health Centre), involvement in Community as well as Residential Transition Care Program, establishment of Falls and balance as well as Cognitive Disorders Clinics, participation in various administrative and professional committees (and finding himself useful in some and not-so-much in others.

Kelly Dungey

Dr Kelly Dungey

Board Member

Dr Kelly Dungey BSocSc(Psyc), MBA, MIB, MBBS, CIME, FAFRM is Medical Director Rehabilitation at Gold Coast Health, Queensland. In addition to serving on the RMSANZ Board of Directors she is a member of the Queensland AFRM Branch Committee and the Co-Chair of the Queensland Rehabilitation Clinical Network. Prior to medicine she worked in business administration and has continued this area of interest by commencing the pathway towards an Associate Fellowship with the Royal Australasian College of Medical Administrators. She is passionate about neurorehabilitation, specifically acquired brain injuries, and seeks to progress the field of Rehabilitation Medicine through research and the development of new models of care.

Sumitiha Gounden

Dr Sumitha Gounden

Board Member

Dr Sumitha Gounden, Rehabilitation Medical Head of Department, Orange Health Service, Clinical Lecturer, Sydney University Medical School of Rural Health and Adjunct Senior Lecturer, School of Rural Medicine, Charles Stuart University.

Sumitha is on the Board of Directors of the Rehabilitation Medical Society Australia New Zealand (RMSANZ) and is the Chair of Disaster Rehabilitation (DR) Special Interest Group, Secretary of the Pain and Musculoskeletal Special Interest Group and Secretary of the Amputee Special Interest Group under the auspices of RMSANZ.

Since 2017, Dr Gounden has been providing international tele-rehabilitation service to a subacute spinal rehabilitation centre in rural India. Her passion is to collaborate with neighbouring Pacific Island nations and improve rehabilitation access and build capacity. Through DR SIG she is currently collaborating with a Fijian Rehabilitation Physician and has planned to run yearly rehabilitation education workshops in Fiji.

Sumitha enjoys education and runs various education workshops including yearly musculoskeletal workshops for AFRM trainees and spasticity workshops in Orange. She also runs a highly successful yearly winter blood donation campaign called “Red Love” across the Western New South Wales region.

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Prof Fary Khan AM

Board Member

Professor Fary Khan AM, MBBS, MD, FAFRM (RACP) Professor Fary Khan is the Director of Rehabilitation at the Royal Melbourne Hospital and Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, Victoria, Australia. She was elected as the Vice Chair of the International Society of Physical & Rehabilitation Medicine (ISPRM) at their Annual Scientific Congress in Lisbon, Portugal on July 2022. She was inducted into the US National Academy of Medicine, and she was also awarded the Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for outstanding contribution to Rehabilitation Medicine and disability in 2022. She is the current Inaugural Academic Fellow on the Board of the Australian Faculty of Rehabilitation Medicine (AFRM), Royal Australian College of Physicians (RACP), and Elected Board Member of the Rehabilitation Medicine Society of Australia & New Zealand (RMSANZ). She is the Australian Representative (AFRM) for the Asia-Oceania Society of Neuro-Rehabilitation and current elected vice president of the society. She is an Executive member of various national and international committees including the WHO-ISPRM Liaison Committee, the UN-ISPRM Liaison Committee, the Women’s Health Task Force, the Cancer Rehabilitation Network ISPRM, ISPRM Disaster Rehabilitation Committee and ClinFIT Taskforce, RMSANZ Disaster Rehabilitation-SIG, and others. She is also sub editor for  Rehabilitation for the Cochrane Collaboration in Milan; and the section editor for the new 7th Edition of Delisa: Principles of Rehabilitation Medicine. 

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Dr Gaj Panagoda

Board Member

Dr Panagoda has held senior medical positions in the public sector and Indigenous community-controlled system.

He has a diverse clinical background as a paediatric rehabilitation physician and general paediatrician in remote and urban Australia.

As the CEO of Xstitch Health, a not-for-profit organisation focused on advancing innovative and integrated models of care, he takes a holistic approach to health. His private practice, Superkid Rehab, works closely with community organisations to maximise efficiency. Dr Panagoda also holds a Master of Business Administration, where he delved into the application of concepts like governance, strategy and future trends in the context of healthcare. He has a passion for aligning rehabilitation medicine with the evolving needs of society and health professionals.

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Dr Alealdin El Malik

Board Member

Brian Zeman

Dr Brian Zeman

Board Member

I am an Australian medical graduate, One of first four graduates of Australian College of Rehabilitation Medicine which was precursor to the Faculty of Rehabilitation Medicine. I was the first Rehabilitation Medicine to get NASQ recognition for ACRM so that our qualifications were recognised as a specialist. I was involved in negotiations with the RACP to be a Faculty with goal that we could charge physician consultation rates for Medicare. I have supervised large numbers of registrars now specialists and have been a faculty examiner over many years. I have been a member of RMSANZ since its inception. I have worked with Prof George Burniston as medical student, Dr Brad Norington as registrar and with Dr Garry Pearce as specialist. I have been involved in rehabilitation of amputees, adult developmental disability, vocational rehabilitation, musculoskeletal and trauma as well as geriatric patients. I have particular interests in Neurorehabilitation and Severe Burns Injury rehabilitation. Currently staff specialist at Ryde and Royal North Shore Hospitals in NSW but also involved in private and medicolegal work.

John Lemon

Mr John Lemon

Company Secretary

John Lemon (BA, LLB (Hons), GDipAppFin (Finsia), Grad.Dip.AppCorpGov, MAICD) is a qualified and former practising solicitor, initially in a large Australian law firm and then in several in-house roles. He works as a contract company secretary, providing company secretary services to various small and medium-sized enterprises.

 

We wish to thank the following members for founding our society

Dr Saul Geffen                         Queensland                            Director         Dr Kong Goh                            Queensland                            Director

Dr Michael Chou                      Victoria                                   Director         Dr Jurriaan De Groot                New Zealand                         Interim Board Member

Dr Alex Ganora                         New South Wales                  President      Dr Peter Harradine                  New South Wales                  Treasurer

Dr Peter Anastassiadis             South Australia                     Director         Dr Peshotan (Pesi) Katrak      New South Wales                   Interim Board Member

Dr Clive Sun                              New South Wales                  Director         Dr Lee Laycock                        New South Wales                   Vice President