Veterinary Epidemiology @ Melbourne
The veterinary epidemiology group is located within the Asia-Pacific Centre for Animal Health (APCAH) at The University of Melbourne.
Our mission is to generate new knowledge and techniques that can lead to improvements in animal health, with an emphasis on identifying emerging areas of inquiry, particularly those that cross disciplinary boundaries.
The group’s remit covers a wide range of international, national and local animal health matters, including:
- Epidemiological support for emergency animal disease preparedness and response (including foot-and-mouth disease, classical swine fever, equine influenza and avian influenza); and
- Epidemiological support for a range of endemic and emerging health issues in farmed livestock, companion animals and wildlife, with a special emphasis on zoonoses.
Working with staff from the microbiology and parasitology groups within the Faculty we provide the link that allows newly developed diagnostic techniques to be deployed with confidence at the population level. In this way, APCAH represents a ‘one stop shop’ for animal health problem solving.
A broad range of expertise is represented within the Centre, including veterinary and agricultural sciences, database development and management, geographic information systems, biostatistics, and quantitative epidemiology. Our group works closely with the Victorian Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), Department of Economic Development, Jobs, Transport and Resources (DEDJTR), Department of Environment Land Water and Planning (DELWP) and the Department of Agriculture, Canberra.
Research Group Contact Information
Name & Honorifics: Professor Mark Stevenson BVSc, MVS, PhD
Title: Professor of Veterinary Epidemiology (One Health)
Group Leader: Vet Epi at Melbourne
Dept: Asia-Pacific Centre for Animal Health
Email: mark.stevenson1@unimelb.edu.au Phone: +61 3 9035 4114Campus: Parkville
Faculty: Faculty of Science, The University of Melbourne
Researchers
Dr Simon Firestone
BVSc, BSc, MAppEpi, PhD
Senior Lecturer in Veterinary Epidemiology and Public Health
Coordinator of the Master of Veterinary Public Health program
Dr Anke WiethoelterMVPHMgt, Dr med vet
Lecturer in Veterinary Epidemiology (One Health)
Our projects
Infectious disease modelling to inform animal and public health policy
Controlling foodborne disease of animal origin
The epidemiology and control of Q fever
Enhancing livestock disease surveillance at the farm level
Bayesian validation of diagnostic tests for emerging infectious diseases
Community-based interventions for free-roaming dog control
Infectious disease modelling to inform animal and public health policy
Modelling outbreaks of infectious diseases of national and international veterinary public health significance in Australia and other countries.
Examples include:
- Modelling foot-and-mouth disease outbreaks in Australia, New Zealand, The United Kingdom, South Korea and Japan.
- Decision support tools for foot-and-mouth disease preparedness.
- Parallel (cluster) computing for modelling complex emergency animal disease outbreaks.
- Modelling the 2007 and future equine influenza outbreaks in Australia.
- Modelling bovine tuberculosis among livestock in New Zealand.
- Modelling arboviral diseases and investigating factors underlying outbreaks
Main contact: Prof Mark Stevenson
Controlling foodborne disease of animal origin
Collaborative research integrating the latest epidemiological and bioinformatics techniques to investigate the spread of foodborne pathogens through animal production systems and reduce public health impacts.
Examples include:
- Studies of the transmission of Salmonella within the poultry industry and the relationship of identified isolates to those affecting humans.
- Involvement in foodborne disease outbreak investigation.
Main contact: Dr Simon Firestone
The epidemiology and control of Q fever
One Health research to prevent a large-scale Q fever outbreak in Australia, reduce public health risk and potential agricultural and environmental impacts
- Outbreak investigation in collaboration with public health, medical and agricultural agencies
- Spatiotemporal analyses of public health surveillance data
- Development and validation of highly accurate diagnostics for Australia’s livestock and wildlife species
- Development and trialling of vaccination options for livestock in Australia
- Estimation of the distribution, animal health and production impacts of coxiellosis in livestock
- Sero-surveillance for Coxiella burnetii in goats, sheep, cattle and wildlife
Main contact: Dr Simon Firestone
Enhancing livestock disease surveillance at the farm level
Collaborations with the Mackinnon project, the Victorian State Government and sheep, goat and cattle industries to enhance detection and reporting of important livestock disease from extensive industries.
- Local area syndromic surveillance and animal movement network analyses.
- Sero-surveillance of anthrax in Victorian cattle.
Main contact: Prof Mark Stevenson
Bayesian validation of diagnostic tests for emerging infectious diseases
Latent class modelling to derive specifications of new diagnostics for emerging infectious diseases of agricultural and public health importance.
- Validation of a new multiplex PCR for bovine theilerosis in collaboration with the FVAS Parasitology group, industry partners and government veterinary agencies in Australia and New Zealand
- Validation of a new ELISA specific for Mycoplasma bovis in cattle in collaboration with the FVAS Microbiology group, industry partners and the Queensland Alliance for Agriculture and Food Innovation
- Validation of an immunofluorence assay specific for Coxiella burnetii in livestock and wildlife, in collaboration with the Australian Rickettsial Reference Laboratory
Main contact: Dr Simon Firestone
Community-based interventions for free-roaming dog control
Collaborative research with non-governmental organisations (Vets Beyond Borders and Animal Management in Rural and Remote Indigenous Communities (AMRRIC):
- Community-based educational intervention to improve school children’s knowledge of rabies and dog bite prevention in Sikkim, India
- Monitoring and evaluation of dog population control interventions.
- A workshop titled ‘Dogs and People: Are We Making a Difference?’ was held at the Veterinary Research Institute, Parkville campus, The University of Melbourne 16 May 16, 2015.
Main contact: Prof Mark Stevenson
Project opportunities
Title
Development of an evaluation pathway for diagnostic tests to be fit for purpose early in infectious disease emergence.
Project description
CSIRO’s Australian Animal Health Laboratory and the University of Melbourne are seeking an applicant for a PhD position to investigate the rapid development and appraisal of diagnostic tests when data are sparse and there is an absence of a gold standard test against which to compare.
The student will be working with partners in the newly established OIE Collaborating Centre for Diagnostic Test Validation Science. Applicants will be expected to have an aptitude for quantitative epidemiology, background in a relevant discipline (veterinary or public health epidemiology, microbiology, applied mathematics and/or computer science), have experience in one of the scientific coding languages (i.e. R, C++, Python, Java, Matlab, etc.) and be eligible for the Australian Research Training Program Scholarship (stipend of AUD 27,000 per year). An additional stipend top-up of AUD 7,000 per year is available.
The project will involve development of methods for the appraisal of diagnostics given sparse data and the absence of gold standards, including developing a single integrated Bayesian latent class model that can account for repeated measures, organisational hierarchy, non-constant sensitivity and specificity, pooling and a paucity of particularly appropriate prior literature. The theoretical elements developed will be applied to case studies of emerging infectious diseases and zoonoses such as Hendra virus, MERS and Q fever.
Research Students
| Salina binti Amad, Doctor of Philosophy, Universiti Putra Malaysia | Project: Evaluation of cattle identification and traceability systems in relation to animal disease control in Malaysia. |
| Aashima Auplish, Doctor of Veterinary Medicine (Research Project), The University of Melbourne | Project: Effectiveness of a community-based educational intervention to improve school children’s knowledge of rabies and dog bite prevention, Sikkim, India, 2014.Collaborators: Vets Beyond Borders, Department of Animal Husbandry, Livestock, Fisheries and Veterinary Services, Government of Sikkim (India). |
| Gemma Chuck, Doctor of Philosophy, The University of Melbourne | Project: The effects of significant pre-weaning events on subsequent lactation and reproductive performance on south-west Victorian dairy farms. Funding agency: Dairy Australia |
| Helen Crabb, Doctor of Philosophy, The University of Melbourne | Project: Controlling foodborne disease of animal origin. Funding agency: Cybec Foundation. Collaborators: Microbiological Diagnostic Unit Public Health Laboratory and poultry industry partners. |
| Hagos Gebrekidan, Doctor of Philosophy, The University of Melbourne | |
| Jane Kelley, Doctor of Philosophy, LaTrobe University | Project: The epidemiology and management of liver fluke in irrigated dairy regions of Victoria. |
| Arata Hidano, Doctor of Philosophy, Massey University | Project: Identification of high-risk pathways for bTB transmission arising from farm-to-farm movement of livestock in New Zealand. |
| Nellie Marquetoux, Doctor of Philosophy, Massey University | Project: Dynamics and Control of Paratuberculosis on Multi-Species Pastoral Farms in New Zealand.Funding agency: Vice Chancellor’s Massey University Doctoral Scholarship Collaborators: Faculty of Veterinary and Agricultural Sciences, The University of Melbourne, Landcorp New Zealand. |
| Michael Muleme, Doctor of Philosophy, The University of Melbourne | Project: The epidemiology and control of Q fever. Funding agency: The University of Melbourne International Research Scholarship.Collaborators:Australian Rickettsial Reference Laboratory. |
| Dinh Nguyen, Doctor of Philosophy, The University of Melbourne | |
| Caitlin Pfeiffer, Doctor of Philosophy, The University of Melbourne | Project: Enhancing livestock disease surveillance at the farm level and network modelling of animal movement data. Funding agency: Victorian Sheep, Goat and Cattle Compensation Funds.Collaborators: Mackinnon project, Department of Economic Development, Jobs, Transport and Resources. |
| Kelly Porter, Master of Veterinary Public Health (Emergency Animal Diseases) VPH Research Project, The University of Melbourne | Project: Sero-surveillance of anthrax in Victorian cattle. Funding agency: Meat and Livestock Australia & CSIRO’s Biosecurity Flagship. Collaborators: AgriBio, Department of Economic Development, Jobs, Transport and Resources. |
| Harun Rashid, Doctor of Philosophy, The University of Melbourne | |
| Kate Richards, Doctor of Philosophy, Massey University | Project: Disease Mapping for Veterinary Epidemiology. Funding agency: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.Collaborators: The University of Melbourne, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. |
| Julia Sarandopoulos, Bachelor of Science (Honours), The University of Melbourne | Project: Early Predictors of the Size and Duration of Foot-and-Mouth Disease Epidemics. Funding agency: Department of Agriculture (Canberra).Collaborators: Department of Agriculture (Canberra), Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (USDA), MPI (New Zealand), AsureQuality (New Zealand), Animal, Plant and Health Agency (United Kingdom), Canadian Food Inspection Agency, The University of Guelph (Canada). |
| Masako Wada, Doctor of Philosophy, Massey University | Project: Economic analysis of national control strategies against foot-and-mouth disease. |
| José Canevari, Doctor of Philosophy, The University of Melbourne | Project: Q fever in intensively managed dairy goat herds: Within-herd disease dynamics and its impact on productivity. |
| Shumoos Al-Riyami, Doctor of Philosophy, The University of Melbourne | Project: Decision support tools for vector-borne diseases of livestock. |
| Ravi Dissanayake, Doctor of Philosophy, The University of Queensland | Project: Using passively collected surveillance data to describe and model spatio-temporal patterns of koala sightings and risk factors for koala mortalities in South-East Queensland, 1997-2014. |
Teaching and Learning
Veterinary Epidemiology Teaching Tools
Descriptive statistics
Descriptive statistics, frequency histograms and transformations
Confidence intervals for means, proportions rates
Critical values from the Normal and t distributions
Reference interval estimation
Dose rate calculator / Constant rate infusion (CRI) calculator
Tools for use in an infectious disease outbreak response
Plots epidemic curve and estimated dissemination ratios
Plot contact tracing data
Plot detection to depopulation intervals (Wada plot)
Create a space-time KML file
Univariable statistics
Measures of association from a 2 by 2 contigency table
Diagnostic test evaluation
Measures of diagnostic test performance from a 2 by 2 contingency table
Pre- and Post-test probabilities (predictive values nomogram)
Betabuster (adapted from Chun-Lung Su's tool to parameterise beta distributions with elicited values)
Gammabuster (tool for parameterising gamma distributions)
Sample size calculations
Sample size to detect disease
Confidence disease has been detected with given sample size
Minimum detectable (design) prevalence with given sample size
Prevalence estimation accounting for clustering
Matched case-control study, with a variable number of controls per case
Deterministic epidemic models
SIR models:
Susceptible-infected-recovered model (vanilla-flavoured)
Susceptible-infected-recovered model with interventions
Susceptible-infected-recovered model with vaccination
Spatial epidemiology
Geocode and map a single address
Geocode and map multiple addresses
Choropleth map by joining xlsx and shp files
Social network analysis (SNA)
Descriptive SNA of an edgelist
Egonet: Plot movements on/off a farm in a network
Dairy Goats tools - click here
VE@M course files - click here
epiR
An R package for the analysis of epidemiological data. Contains functions for directly and indirectly adjusting measures of disease frequency, quantifying measures of association on the basis of single or multiple strata of count data presented in a contingency table, and computing confidence intervals around incidence risk and incidence rate estimates. Miscellaneous functions for use in meta-analysis, diagnostic test interpretation, and sample size calculations.
Incursion R package
An R package for the analysis of infectious disease outbreaks in animal populations.
- Click here to download version 0.1-18 of the incursion package for Windows.
- Click here to download version 0.1-18 of the incursion package for Linux.
Study
- Master of Veterinary Public Health (Emergency Animal Diseases)
- Graduate Diploma of Veterinary Public Health
- Graduate Certificate of Veterinary Public Health
- Doctor of Veterinary Medicine: Infections Population and Public Health
- Veterinary Public Health and Epidemiology
- Bachelor of Science: Animal Disease Biotechnology
- Master of Veterinary Studies: Clinical Residents Program
- Dairy clinical residents - research design and analysis, epidemiology, veterinary public health
- Veterinary hospital clinical residents - research design and analysis
Recent Publications
Book chapter
Glanville, R.J., Firestone, S.M., More, S.J., in press. Biosecurity and bioethics. In: Ten Have, H. (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Global Bioethics.
Publications in peer-reviewed journals
2015
- Perera, P.K., Gasser, R.B., Firestone, S.M., Smith, L., Roeber, F., Jabbar, A., 2015. Semi-quantitative Multiplexed-Tandem PCR for the Detection and Differentiation of Four Theileria orientalis Genotypes in Cattle. Journal of Clinical Microbiology 53, 79-87.
- Perera, P.K., Gasser, R.B., Pulford, D.J., Stevenson, M., Firestone, S.M., McFadden, A.M.J., Jabbar, A., 2015. Comparison of the performance of three PCR Assays for the Detection and Differentiation of Theileria orientalis Genotypes. Parasites and Vectors 8, 192-202.
2014
- Alawneh, J., Stevenson, M., Williamson, N., Lopez-Villalobos, N., 2014. The use of liveweight change as an indicator of oestrus in a seasonally calving, pasture-fed dairy herd. Reproduction in Domestic Animals.
- Alawneh, J., Stevenson, M., Williamson, N., Lopez-Villalobos, N., Otley, T., 2014. The effects of liveweight loss and milk production on the risk of lameness in a seasonally calving, pasture fed dairy herd in New Zealand. Preventive Veterinary Medicine 113, 72 - 79.
- Allepuz, A., Stevenson, M., Kivaria, F., Berkvens, D., Casal, J., Picado, A., 2013. Risk factors for foot-and-mouth disease in Tanzania, 2001-2006. Transboundary and Emerging Diseases.
- Borba, M., Stevenson, M., Goncalves, V., Ferreira Neto, J., Ferreira, F., Amaku, M., Telles, E., Santana, S., Ferreira, J., Lôbo, J., Figueiredo, V., Dias, R., 2013. Prevalence and risk-mapping of bovine brucellosis in Maranhão State, Brazil Preventive Veterinary Medicine 110, 169 - 176.
- Firestone, S.M., Lewis, F.I., Schemann, K.A., Ward, M.P., Toribio, J.-A.L.M.L., Taylor, M.R., Dhand, N.K., 2014. Applying Bayesian network modelling to understand the links between on-farm biosecurity practice during the 2007 equine influenza outbreak and horse managers’ perceptions of a subsequent outbreak. Preventive Veterinary Medicine 116, 243-251.
- Hamoonga, R., Stevenson, M., Allepuz, A., Sinkala, Y., 2014. Risk factors for foot-and-mouth disease in Zambia, 1981-2012. Preventive Veterinary Medicine 114, 64 - 71.
- McFadden, A., Tham, K.-M., Stevenson, M., Goodwin, M., Pharo, H., Taylor, B., Munro, G., Owen, K., Peacock, L., Stanslawek, W., Stone, M., 2014. Israeli acute paralysis virus not detected in Apis mellifera in New Zealand in a national survey Journal of Apicultural Research 53, 520 - 527.
- Jordan, H., Dunt, D., Hollingsworth, B., Firestone, S.M., Burgman, M., 2014. Costing the Morbidity and Mortality Consequences of Zoonoses Using Health-Adjusted Life Years. Transbound Emerg Dis, 1-12.
- Korennoy, F., Gulenkin, V., Malone, J., Mores, C., Dudnikov, S., Stevenson, M., 2014. Spatio-temporal modeling of the African swine fever epidemic in the Russian Federation, 2007–2012. Spatial and Spatio-temporal Epidemiology 11, 135 - 141.
- León, E., Perez, A., Stevenson, M., Robiolo, B., Mattion, N., Seki, C., La Torre, J., Torres, A., Cosentino, B., Duffy, S., 2014. Effectiveness of foot and mouth disease systematic mass vaccination campaigns in Argentina. Revue Scientifique et Technique de l'Office International des Epizooties 33, 917 - 926.
- Perera, P.K., Gasser, R.B., Firestone, S.M., Anderson, G.A., Malmo, J., Davis, G., Beggs, D.S., Jabbar, A., 2014. Oriental theileriosis causes significant milk production losses in dairy cows. Parasites and Vectors 7, 73-80.
- Richards, K., Hazelton, M., Stevenson, M., Lockhart, C., Pinto, J., Nguyen, L., 2014. Using exceedance probabilities to detect anomalies in routinely recorded animal health data, with particular reference to foot-and-mouth disease in Viet Nam. Spatial and Spatio-Temporal Epidemiology 11, 125 - 133.
- Roche, S., Garner, M., Sanson, R., Cook, C., Birch, C., Backer, J., Dube, C., Patyk, K., Stevenson, M., Rawdon, T., Yu, Z., Gauntlett, F., 2014. Evaluating vaccination strategies to control foot-and-mouth disease: a model comparison study. Epidemiology and Infection.
- Rosanowski, S., Cogger, N., Rogers, C., Bolwell, C., Benschop, J., Stevenson, M., 2013. Analysis of horse movements from non-commercial horse properties in New Zealand. New Zealand Veterinary Journal 61, 245 - 253.
- Rosanowski, S., Cogger, N., Rogers, C., Stevenson, M., 2014. Evaluating the effectiveness of strategies for the control of equine influenza virus in the New Zealand equine population. Transboundary and Emerging Diseases.
- Smith, S., Wilson, P., Collett, M., Heuer, C., West, D., Stevenson, M., Chambers, J., 2014. Liver biopsy histopathology for diagnosis of Johne's disease in sheep. Veterinary Pathology 51, 915 - 918.
- Widanarko, B., Legg, S., Devereux, J., Stevenson, M., 2014. The combined effect of physical, psychosocial/organisational and/or environmental risk factors on the presence of work-related musculoskeletal symptoms and its consequences. Applied Ergonomics 45, 1610 - 1621.
2013
- Abeywardena, H., Jex, A.R., Firestone, S.M., McPhee, S., Driessen, N., Koehler, A.V., Haydon, S.R., Stevens, M.A., Gasser, R.B., 2013. Assessing calves as carriers of Cryptosporidium and Giardia with zoonotic potential on dairy and beef farms within a water catchment area by mutation scanning. Electrophoresis 34, 2259–2267.
- Dawson, K., Stevenson, M., Sinclair, J., Bosson, M., 2014. Recurrent bovine tuberculosis in New Zealand cattle and deer herds, 2006–2010. Epidemiology and Infection.
- Davies, P., Alexander, B., Bender, J., Deen, J., Dewey, C., Funk, J., Munoz-Zanzi, C., O'Sullivan, M., Singer, R., Sreevatsan, S., Stärk, K., Stevenson, M., 2013. Livestock density as risk factor for livestock associated MRSA, The Netherlands. Emerging Infectious Diseases 19, 1551 - 1552.
- Dias, R., Gil Alves Guilloux, A., Borba, M., de Lourdes Guarnieri, M., Prist, R., Ferreira, F., Amaku, M., Ferreira Neto, J., Stevenson, M., 2013. Size and spatial distribution of stray dog population in the University of São Paulo campus, Brazil Preventive Veterinary Medicine 110, 263 - 273.
- Farnworth, M., Beausoleil, N., Adams, N., Barrett, L., Stevenson, M., Thomas, D., Waterland, M., Waran, N., Stafford, K., 2013. Validating the use of a carbon dioxide laser for assessing nociceptive thresholds in adult domestic cats (Felis catus). Applied Animal Behaviour Science 143, 104 - 109.
- Firestone, S.M., Lewis, F.I., Schemann, K., Ward, M.P., Toribio, J.-A.L.M.L., Dhand, N.K., 2013. Understanding the associations between on-farm biosecurity practice and equine influenza infection during the 2007 outbreak in Australia. Preventive Veterinary Medicine 110, 28-36.
- Flint, E., Minot, E., Stevenson, M., Perry, P., Stafford, K., 2013. Barking in home alone suburban dogs (Canis familiaris) in New Zealand. Journal of Veterinary Behavior: Clinical Applications and Research 8, 302 - 305.
- Klingseisen, B., Stevenson, M., Corner, R., 2013. Prediction of Bluetongue virus seropositivity on pastoral properties in northern Australia using remotely sensed bioclimatic variables. Preventive Veterinary Medicine 110, 159 - 168.
- Neumann, E., Hall, W., Stevenson, M., Morris, R., Than, L., 2013. Descriptive and temporal analysis of post-mortem lesions recorded in slaughtered pigs in New Zealand from 2000 to 2010. New Zealand Veterinary Journal 62, 110 - 116.
- Nguyen, L., Stevenson, M., Schauer, B., Nguyen, D., Tran, Q., Tien, T., Tran, P., Jones, G., Prattley, D., Morris, R., 2013. Descriptive results of a prospective cohort study of avian influenza in the Mekong River Delta of Viet Nam. Transboundary and Emerging Diseases.
- Schemann, K., Firestone, S.M., Taylor, M.R., Toribio, J.-A.L., Ward, M.P., Dhand, N.K., 2013. Perceptions of vulnerability to a future outbreak: a study of horse managers affected by the first Australian equine influenza outbreak. BMC Veterinary Research 9, 152-161.
- Schemann, K., Lewis, F.I., Firestone, S.M., Ward, M.P., Toribio, J.-A.L.M.L., Taylor, M.R., Dhand, N.K., 2013. Untangling the complex inter-relationships between horse managers’ perceptions of effectiveness of biosecurity practices using Bayesian graphical modelling. Preventive Veterinary Medicine 110, 37-44.
- Stevenson, M., Sanson, R., Stern, M., O'Leary, B., Sujau, M., Molles-Benfell, N., Morris, R., 2013. InterSpread Plus: a spatial and stochastic simulation model of disease in animal populations Preventive Veterinary Medicine 109, 10 - 24.
- Widanarko, B., Legg, S., Stevenson, M., Devereux, J., Jones, G., 2013. Prevalence of low back symptoms and its consequences in relation to occupational group. American Journal of Industrial Medicine 56, 576 - 589.
Upcoming seminars
VE@M epi think tank – Meeting schedule 2023
Past Events
- Interpretation and Validation of Diagnostic Tests in Veterinary Science: 17-19 November 2018, OIE Collaborating Centre for Diagnostic Test Validation Science in the Asia-Pacific Region, Chiang Mai, Thailand.
- Geographic Information Systems (GIS) for Spatial Analysis of Animal Health Data: 15-19 October 2018, OIE Sub-Regional Representation for Southeast Asia, Bangkok, Thailand.
- A Short Course on Fixed- and Mixed-Effects Regression Modelling for Veterinarians: 30 July 2018 - 2 August 2018, Department of Animal Health, Hanoi, Vietnam.
- Epi in the Garden City - A short course on Multilevel Modelling: 9-13 April 2018, University of Queensland, Toowoomba, Queensland.
- OIE Sub-Regional Training on the use of GIS to Strengthen Animal Disease Surveillance and Control. 9-11 October 2017, OIE Sub-Regional Representation for Southeast Asia, Bangkok, Thailand.
- Foundations in Infectious Disease Modelling: 2-4 July 2018, Annual Meeting of the Epidemiology Chapter of the Australian and New Zealand College of Veterinary Scientists, Surfers Paradise, Queensland.
- Epi in the Vineyard - A Short Course on Quantitative Bias Analysis and Dealing with Missing Data: 3-7 April 2017, University of Adelaide, Tanunda, South Australia.
- 5th International One Health Congress and 6th Biennale Conference of the International Association for Ecology and Health: 4-7 December 2016, Melbourne Convention Centre, Melbourne, Victoria.
- Dogs and People: Mastering Stakeholder Engagement for Sustainable Impacts: 3 December 2016, Old Arts Building Theatre A, University of Melbourne.
- Spatial Epidemiology 2.0 from Addresses and Polygons to Interactive Dashboards: 4-6 July 2016, Annual Meeting of the Epidemiology Chapter of the Australian and New Zealand College of Veterinary Scientists, Surfers Paradise, Queensland.
- Multilevel Modelling in Veterinary and Agricultural Science: 29 March - 1 April 2016. Faculty of Veterinary and Agricultural Sciences, University of Melbourne.
- Dogs and People: Are we Making a Difference? 16 May 2015. Faculty of Veterinary and Agricultural Sciences, University of Melbourne.
- Outbreak Response and Decision Making: Foot-and-Mouth Disease Workshop: 20 February 2015. Faculty of Veterinary and Agricultural Sciences, University of Melbourne.
- Recent Advances in Emergency Animal Diseases Symposium: 5-6 November 2014. CSIRO Australian Animal Health Laboratory, Geelong.