Helen Bourke-Taylor PhD is: 

• Honours by research project coordinator in the Department of Occupational Therapy
• Unit coordinator for  OCC3072 and OCC4091 in the Research stream for the BOT(Hons)
• Chair of the Research Committee, Department of Occupational Therapy 
• An active researcher in the School of Primary and Allied Health Care 

Helen Bourke-Taylor is an occupational therapist and Professor (Teaching and Research) at Monash University, Melbourne Australia. Since graduating in 1990, Helen has worked as an occupational therapist in paedatrics in Melbourne (Royal Children's Hospital) and with adults in neurorehabilitation in Chicago (Chicago Institute of Neurosurgery and Neuroresearch). Helen has worked with mothers of children with disabilities in her codesigned and codelivered program Healthy Mothers Healthy Families since completeing her PhD in 2010.  

Research Summary

Helen is a Fellow  of the Occupational Therapy Australia Research Academy. Helen’s research interests include participation and education issues for children and young people with disabilities, support for families, maternal health and wellbeing, and psychometrics related to scale and outcome tool development. Helen is author of over 100 peer reviewed publications and recipient of more than 5.6 million in grant funding for high impact community activities related to the health, wellbeing and participation of mothers of children with disabilities and children/young people with disabilities.  

As designer of the evidence-based Healthy Mothers Healthy Families (HMHF) programs and an expert in online teaching and learning, Helen has created a self paced package for mothers of children with a disability and professionals who work with mothers. The site is freely available here: https://healthymothers-healthyfamilies.com/.  

Helen has four psychometrically sound assessment tools including the Health Promoting Activities Scale, the Child’s Challenging Behaviour Scale, the Assistance to Participate Scale and the MyFACE (My Families Community Accessibility and Engagement). The scales have been translated to several languages and used in various studies to measure health behaviour change in carers, refugees and injured service personal, as well as measuring the relationship between childhood disability and parental self management. 

Research Interests and specific skills:

• Evidence based practice in occupational therapy, particularly paediatric practice
• Outcome tool development
• Packaging interventions online and for face to face delivery including embedding outcome measures 
• Maternal health and wellbeing
• Family focused research
• Online teaching and learning
• Occupational therapy curriculum
• Advancement of occupational therapy and allied health research

Teaching/research Summary

Helen has integrated pedagogy and curriculum packaging throughout her research activties, including within the HMHF programs, designing the first fully online continuing professional development Supporting People with Autism Spectrum Disorders and their Families for Occupational Therapy Australia, the peak body for Australia's 30,000 OTs.