Professor Judith Parker

Professor Judith Parker has been involved in nursing education since 1963, particularly in the transition of nursing eduction from a hospital based system to the tertiary sector, where she is an acknowledged scholar and leader. She has been the Foundation Professor of two university Schools of Nursing and the Foundation Editor of the Australian based international nursing journal, Nursing Inquiry.

Judith has made a significant contribution to the community from a female dominated profession, which when she started her training in 1954 was typified as a handmaiden vocational roll. Amongst her major achievements, are her influence on the nursing profession and her research. Judith's PhD thesis was 'Cancer Passage: Continuity and Discontinuity in Terminal Illness' and she has continued with significant studies in this area of grief and palliative care.

She has published extensively in national and international journals and books. She has also undertaken research in the following areas: nursing labour force; evaluation of palliative care; twenty four hour home nursing; critical care education; patient progress notes; handover; narratives of nursing; recording nursing practice; best practice rosters; nursing case mix; evidence based nursing; nurse practitioner evaluation; and palliative care.

She has been on the boards of management of the Wesley Central Mission, the Alfred Group of Hospitals, Victorian Hospitals Association, Victorian Palliative Care Education and Training Committee, Very Special Kids, Case Management Society of Australia, Victorian Case mix Consortium and is a current Director of the Victorian Centre for Evidence Based Nursing Practice and the Victorian Centre for Nursing Practice Research. Judith has written many papers for both Australian and International audiences. Quality nursing practice is her focus.

She has represented the nursing profession on Commonwealth and State government committees over the past decades. She has three remarkable firsts, two foundation chairs and the first Editor of Nursing Inquiry. Her major professional interests are discipline development in nursing through research and scholarship; policy practice and training in home and ambulatory care; organisational change and educational administration; historical and philosophical issues in nursing; feminist thought in nursing and looking after the whole person.

Her contribution to Australian nursing has been a leading force in changing approaches to patient care. She established the Victorian Centre for Nursing Practice Research to bring together often competing stakeholders from health and tertiary sectors into a collaborative effort.