Griffith University

MBBS, FRACGP, FACRRM, FAChPM
Associate Professor

Gold Coast Health Service District - Director Palliative Care Services

Contact details for Associate Professor Rohan Vora

Biography

Associate Professor Rohan Vora worked for many years as a procedural rural GP in many settings: emergency medicine, anaesthetics, indigenous health, neonatal resuscitation, aged care and mental health. He decided to specialise in Palliative Medicine several years ago and now works as Director of the GCHSD Palliative Care Services. He is keen to develop a seamless population-wide service for all patients and their families receiving Palliative Care in the last 12 months of life. He is passionate about seeing that all patients and their families receive best quality care that is whole-patient centred and Quality of Life (QoL) focussed at the End of Live (EoL). Rohan now enjoys clinical practice, being a team leader, teaching students, and doing research and further study.

Memberships & affiliations

• ANZSPM Chair of the Clinical Indicators Working Group
• RACGP National Standing Committee Quality Care (portfolios in Aged & Palliative Care)
• RACGP representative on the National Aged Care Alliance
• RACGP representative on the Rural Health Service Education & Training Committee designing an educational training  module in Oncology & Palliative Care for rural GP's and primary care nurses
• RACGP representative on Flinders University Knowledge Network in Palliative care national project (funded by DoHA)
• Member of the National Brain Tumour Guidelines Palliative Care Sub-committee

Research interests

• Advance Care Planning and End of Life Care (last 12 months of life)
• Supportive and Palliative Care - Early symptom management and QOL, depression at EoL, care of the dying, communication and hope in last 12 months of life
• Evidence Based Practice (EBP) and quality care - Evidence Based Decision Making (EBDM) at point of clinical decision making
• Implementation of EBP into clinical pratice across a district-wide service
• Quality outcome measurement across a population in all settings
  

Current research projects

• Investigate the usefulness of Methylphenidate for Cancer-Related Fatigue and the feasibility of using Single Patient Trial methodology in an advanced cancer and pall care setting - NHMRC - Chief Investigator (1 of 7 - Mitchell, Currow, Hardy, Nikles, Schluter, Yelland) (2007-2010).
• Investigate the detection rate of Depression in our Palliative Care service prior to our institution of validated depression screening tools. Monitor outcomes for depression after instituting a systematic screening and management system in our Palliative Care Unit at Gold Coast HSD.

Publications

Books

• Silver Book (2006)  - Palliative Care Chapters RACGP/commonwealth funded manual for GP's caring for patients in Nursing Homes throughout Australia.
• A Strategic Framework for Health Care of Older People (2006) - National Aged Care Alliance.

Refereed journal article

• Hardy JR, Carmont S-A S, O'Shea A, Vora R, Schluter P, Nikles CJ, Mitchell GK (2010) Pilot Study To Determine the Optimal Dose of Methylphenidate for an n-of-1 Trial for Fatigue in Patients with Cancer. Journal of Palliative Medicine. 13(10):1-6.
• Vora R, Hardy J (2004) A good death down under. RACP Internal Medicine Journal. 34:450-452.