Associate Professor Jane Fisher, BSc Qld PhD Melb. MAPS
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Background
Associate Professor Jane Fisher is the Deputy Director and Coordinator of International Research and Education at the Centre. Jane Fisher first joined the staff of the Key Centre as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in 1994, and was promoted to Associate Professor in 2006. She teaches in the Master of Women's Health and Master of Public Health course work programs, in short courses not for academic credit and lectures undergraduate medical students on obstetrics and gynaecology rotation to the Royal Women's Hospital. In collaboration with Melbourne Consulting and Custom Programs she coordinates and teaches in the Japanese language Master of Women's Health. She supervises PhD, Masters and Advanced Medical Science students.
Jane Fisher's broad research interest is in the links between reproductive health and mental health, including the short term psychological impact of: fertility difficulties and assisted reproductive technologies, pregnancy loss and operative interventions in childbirth and their longer term impact on postpartum maternal adjustment and early parenting difficulties.
In 2007, on behalf of the World Health Organization and the United Nations Fund for Population Activities, she convened the first International Expert Meeting on: The interface between reproductive health and mental health. Maternal mental health and child health and development in resource constrained settings. The meeting was held in Hanoi and included a representative group of people who have published research in this field from low and lower middle income countries and Vietnamese researchers, health professionals and policy makers. The outcome of the meeting was a Statement signed by all participants entitled: Maternal mental health and child survival, health and development in resource-constrained settings: essential for achieving the Millennium Development Goals.
Associate Professor Fisher is a chief investigator on a suite of research projects based at the Key Centre for Women's Health in Society which fall under the research themes, mental health and wellbeing and reproductive and sexual health. These include:
- Mothers Fathers and Newborns, Promoting Confidence and preventing Distress, A PsychoEducational Program for Parents of a first newborn (PEPP). It is a four-year project, funded by the Australian Government Department of Family and Community Services and Indigenous Affairs and was initiated by a seed grant from beyondblue and the Victorian Centre for Depression and Related Disorders. It is a formal evaluation of a carefully developed one-day seminar of parents with a new baby. It focuses on knowledge and skills development in two salient areas: management of infant crying and fair ways to renegotiate the unpaid workload.
- Parental Age and Transition to Parenthood Australia (PATPA) which is funded by an Australian Research Council Linkage grant and is a collaboration between the Key Centre for Women’s Health in Society and Macquarie University with industry partners Melbourne IVF and IVF Australia. It is investigating the separate and combined effects of age and mode of conception on health and adjustment to parenthood in Australian mothers.
Research Interests
- Reproductive mental health, including the impact of social circumstance, new technologies, medical procedures and operative interventions on maternal psychological functioning
- The impact of non-clinical factors on medical decision-making
- Psychologically-informed health care
- Perinatal mental health in resource-constrained settings
Key Publications
Fisher J, Tran thu thi Huong, Tran Tuan. (2007) Relative socioeconomic advantage and mood during advanced pregnancy in women in Vietnam Journal of International Mental Health Systems; 1:3 doi:10.1186/1752-4458-1-3
Fisher JRW, Hammarberg K, Baker G. (2007) Antenatal mood and foetal attachment after assisted conception. Fertility and Sterility, doi: 10.1016/j.fertnstert.2007.05.022.
Fisher JRW, Cabral de Mello M, Tran T, Izutsu T. (2007) Maternal mental health and child survival, health and development in resource-constrained settings: essential for Achieving the Millennium Development Goals. Statement from the UNFPA – WHO International Expert Meeting: The interface between reproductive health and mental health. Maternal mental health and child health and development in resource constrained settings. Hanoi, Viet Nam, June 2007.
Fisher JRW, Tran T. (2007) Report of the UNFPA – WHO International Expert Meeting: The interface between reproductive health and mental health. Maternal mental health and child health and development in resource constrained settings, Hanoi, Vietnam.
Cooklin A, Fisher JRW, Rowe H. Employee entitlements during pregnancy and maternal psychological wellbeing. (2007) Australian and New Zealand Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, 47(6): 483 – 490.
Fisher JRW, Psychosocial implications of multiple gestation and birth. (2006) Australian and New Zealand Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology; 46; 26 – 32
Rowe HJ, Fisher JRW, Quinlivan JA. (2006) Are pregnant Australian women well- informed about prenatal genetic screening? A systematic investigation using the Multidimensional Measure of Informed Choice. Australian and New Zealand Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, 46: 433–439
Cabral de Mello M, Fisher JRW, Patel V, Rahman A. (2005) Mental Health of Mothers and Children. World Health Report 2005; 65
Fisher JRW, Rowe H, Tattam A. (2005) Early parenting difficulties: implications for health services policy. Health Issues , 84: 18 – 21.
Fisher JRW, Hammarberg K. Baker HWG. (2005) Assisted conception: a risk factor for perinatal mood disturbance and early parenting difficulties? Fertility and Sterility, 84(2); 426 - 430.
Fisher JRW and Rowe, H. (2005) Building an evidence base for practice in early parenting centres: A systematic review of the literature and a report of an outcome study. Melbourne: Key Centre for Women's Health in Society, The University of Melbourne.
Fisher JRW, Morrow MM, Nhu Ngoc NT, Hoang Anh LT. (2004) Prevalence, nature, severity and correlates of postpartum depressive symptomatology in Ho Chi Minh City Vietnam. BJOG, an International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, 111: 1353 - 1360
Fisher JRW, Rowe, H.J. and Feekery, C.J . (2004) Temperament and behaviour of infants aged 4 - 12 months on admission to a private mother baby unit and at one and six month follow up. The Clinical Psychologist 8(1), 15 - 21.
Fisher JRW, Feekery, C.J. and Rowe, H.J. (2003) Treatment of maternal mood disorder and infant behaviour disturbance in an Australian private mothercraft unit: a follow-up study. Archives of Women's Mental Health 7(Suppl 1), S1 - S5.
Fisher JRW, and Stocky, A.J. (2003) Maternal perinatal mental health and multiple birth: implications for practice. Twin Research 6(6), 506 - 513.