Inaugural Lecture of Professor Juliette Hussey

Juliette Hussey, Professor of Cancer Rehabilitation and Survivorship

Professor Hussey qualified in Physiotherapy from UCD and spent eight years working clinically in the Mater Hospital in Dublin and Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospital in London. While working in Great Ormond Street she completed an MSc in King’s College London. She came to Trinity in 1992 as an Assistant Professor in Physiotherapy, was promoted to Associate Professor in 2006, Professor in Physiotherapy in 2015 and was successful in obtaining a personal chair in 2022. In 2001 along with Professor John Gormley, Professor Chris Bell and Professor Ian Graham she developed an MSc in Cardiac Rehabilitation which commenced in 2002. She obtained a PhD from Trinity in 2007 on “The inter-relationship between physical activity, fitness and body composition in children”.

She was head of the discipline of Physiotherapy from 2003-2014. During that time, in addition to developing another Masters programme, she led on developing undergraduate programmes in Physiotherapy and allied health sciences delivered in Singapore. These one-year programmes in Physiotherapy, Occupational Therapy, Radiation Therapy and Diagnostic Radiography were the first programmes to be developed with universities overseas and were at the frontier of Trinity’s Global Engagement Strategy.

Professor Hussey was elected to fellowship in 2011 and appointed as Vice President for Global Relations for two terms (2014-2021). During that time she delivered on an ambitious global relations strategy, developed a number of highly successful reputational partnerships with leading universities globally including the dual degree with Columbia University.

Professor Hussey leads a group working in the area of exercise rehabilitation in patients with cancer. Most of this research is in conjunction with colleagues in St James’s Hospital and in particular the Department of Surgery under Professor John Reynolds. Her research is translational and is aimed at scientifically improving exercise prescription to optimise therapeutic responses. This includes evaluating means of improving physical capacity preoperatively to reduce postoperative morbidity for patients undergoing complex cancer surgery, developing rehabilitation strategies for patients with oesophageal cancer and understanding the rehabilitation needs of people living with and beyond cancer including adolescents and young adults. As part of a recent network grant she will lead on work examining how a number of lifestyle interventions in people with Barrett’s Oesophagus and people after surgical resection for Oesophageal Cancer can improve overall physical health.

She has developed extensive collaborations with colleagues across the University and St James’s Hospital and has co-supervised PhD students with the School of Psychology, Department of Physiology, Department of Surgery, Department of Histopathology, Department of Paediatrics, Department of Clinical Medicine and the Department of Public Health and Primary Care. She has supervised 31 postgraduate students to successful completion and currently is supervising three MSc students and two PhD students.

She has obtained over 4.5 million euro in grant funding from the Health Research Board, the Irish Cancer Society, World Cancer Research Fund and Breakthrough Cancer Research. Professor Hussey has over 110 full-paper publications.

She is a member of the Board of St James’s Hospital and sits on the Quality, Safety and Risk Committee. She leads the Survivorship Research Theme in the Trinity St James’s Cancer Institute, sits on the senior council of the Irish Association for Cancer Research ( IACR) and is part of leading the Living with and Beyond Cancer pillar of the All- Island Cancer Research Institute ( AICRI).

Host or Publisher Faculty of Health Sciences, Trinity College Dublin