From Dutch innovation to Aussie inspiration

Dr Kris Tulloch went to the Netherlands to study dementia care. She came home with a new research idea.

With support from a Foundation travel grant, Kris spent time with researchers at Maastricht University, visited aged care facilities and took part in a study comparing approaches to residential aged care in Australia and the Netherlands.

But something else piqued her interest: Maastricht's Living Lab. It brings universities and aged care providers together, so researchers can work directly with the people and services their research is intended to benefit.

Kris wondered if this model could work back in Australia.

The University of the Sunshine Coast decided to take a punt and awarded her $25,000 to explore the idea of establishing a Healthy Ageing Living Lab in Southeast Queensland.

If successful, Kris hopes a living lab could change how researchers and aged care providers work together, moving away from individual projects towards longer-term partnerships built around the challenges aged care services face.

Kris says the biggest benefit of receiving a travel grant wasn’t from attending an international conference (although she attended several!). It was having the time to work alongside researchers and seeing their living lab first-hand.

“It was one of those moments of the penny dropping, where you have to see something in action for it to really come through.

“The grant has been transformative for me in that way. It was a sense of having arrived with a focus and what I wanted to try to do with my career.”

Amazing work, Kris. Another brilliant example of our supported researchers doing research that really matters.