Associate Professor Debra Phyland, PhD, MAppSc, DipEd, BAppSc, FSPAA, is a speech pathologist having primarily worked for the past 36 years in acute hospital settings, part-time lecturing in voice, neurological and dysphagia subjects and running her private voice practice. A/Prof Phyland is also a music theatre singer-performer combining her love of performance with her speech pathology career, bringing voice medicine to the performing arts. As well as being a co-founder and owner of the Melbourne Voice Analysis Centre team, she is the principal speech pathologist (SP) for Voice Medicine Australia (a team of 8 speech pathologists dedicated to all things ‘splaryngology’). A/Prof Phyland is appointed as Associate Professor for the School of Clinical Sciences at Monash Health, Monash University working part-time as Director of Clinical Research for the ENT, Head and Neck Department of Monash Health.

For over twenty-two years, A/Prof Phyland has been the resident voice consultant for Melbourne Theatre Company and countless professional national music theatre productions, including currently Frozen, Moulin Rouge and Six the Musical. In recognition of her sustained input, she was the recipient of a Victorian Green Room Award ‘Outstanding Contribution to the Melbourne Stage’ in 2012 and an Australian Voice Association award for ‘Outstanding contribution to the Australian voice community’ in 2014.

A/Prof Phyland is well published and regularly invited to present at international conferences. In 2002, she was the recipient of a Churchill Fellowship and along with Fellowship category (2014), A/Prof Phyland has also been honoured with the prestigious Speech Pathology Australia Association’s Elinor Wray Award (2010) for ‘Outstanding contribution to the profession’. She has won several other awards and scholarships, including a two-year fulltime Garnet-Passe Post-Doctoral fellowship, 2016-2018.

A/Prof Phyland is a past-president of the Laryngology Society of Australasia (2014-2017), past board member of the Australian Voice Association and current Chair of the Voice Committee for International Association of Communication Sciences and Disorders (IALP). Her researchand clinical interests include neurolaryngology, professional and occupational voice disorders, outcome measurement, functional airway obstruction disorders, voice assessment and rehabilitation.