HALL OF FAME

Dr Gweneth Roberts (nee Collins)

2016 Inductee

Student 1951 - 1954

Dr Gweneth Roberts RN BBus (Health Admin, with distinction) PhD, graduated dux of Ipswich Girls’ Grammar School in 1954 and has dedicated her life to community service, advocacy and education. Although she was unable to attend university after school, the story of her subsequent pathway through nursing (general and midwifery), motherhood, education, health economics and research, culminating in a PhD in 1995, is testament to her determination to pursue an academic career.

Dr Roberts’ doctoral thesis involved ground-breaking research on the presentation of survivors of domestic violence at the Emergency Department of a major public hospital (the first such work in Australia), leading to educational programs for doctors, nurses and social workers. As an epidemiologist in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Queensland, she has published extensively in the areas of adult and child abuse, including a widely recognised textbook for general practitioners and other health workers.

Dr Roberts has been active in many other areas, especially relating to women’s health and equality – a member of the first women’s advisory body to the Premier of Queensland in 1991, as a childbirth educator, breast cancer epidemiologist with the Queensland Health Department, instructor of Encore Program supporting women with breast cancer, and teaching communication to Queensland University medical students. With her late husband of 53 years, Dr John Roberts, she has been a long standing supporter for social justice, providing accommodation and other resources to those in need. She was the founder of the Brisbane chapter of the Movement of the Ordination of Women with the Australian Anglican Church.