Flinders University’s Professor Jaquelyne Hughes has been recognised for her transformative and life saving contributions to kidney research and clinical work with a prestigious Lowitja Research Institute Cranlana Award for Outstanding Research Leadership.

Professor Hughes – a Matthew Flinders Professor and inaugural Clinical Research Professor for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Advancement at Flinders University in Darwin – is a specialist nephrologist with experience in chronic kidney disease, dialysis and also health systems research and innovation.

Lowitja Institute is Australia’s only national Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community-controlled health research institute named in honour of its patron, Dr Lowitja O’Donoghue AC CBE DSG.

The national awards honour outstanding Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health research achievement, and celebrate excellence and contribution to the health and wellbeing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. This year’s Lowitja Institute International Indigenous Health and Wellbeing Conference was held in Cairns, on the lands of the Gimuy Walubarra Yidinji and Yirrganydji peoples.

Professor Huges was joint-recipient of the Cranlana Awards for Outstanding Research Leadership alongside Professor James Ward, a descendent of the Pitjantjatjara and Nurrunga clans of central and southern Australia and Director of the Poche Centre for Indigenous Health at the University of Queensland.

Read more about Professor Hughes’ award on the Flinders newsblog and on the National Indigenous Times website.