Dr Gabrielle McCallum

Senior Research Fellow and Senior Lecturer, Child and Maternal Health Division

Qualifications:

National Excellence in Education Leadership, Women in Leadership, 2017; PhD, Charles Darwin University, 2015; Masters of Public Health, Charles Darwin University, 2010; Graduate Diploma of Public Health, Charles Darwin University, 2008; Bachelor of Nursing, University of South Australia, 1998

Approved level of HDR supervision at Charles Darwin University:

Primary Supervisor

Location:

Darwin - Royal Darwin Hospital campus

Biography:

Dr Gabrielle McCallum is a Senior Research Fellow and Senior Lecturer, Nurse academic, and Program Leader of Menzies’ Child Health Respiratory team in Darwin. Having worked in the Northern Territory for over two decades, Gabrielle’s passion is to improve clinical outcomes for children at-risk for poor lung health outcome, through preventing early and recurrent acute lower respiratory infections, evidence-based research, culturally appropriate educational resources, and translating research findings into meaningful and culturally appropriate outcomes. 

Gabrielle’s work includes multiple large, NHMRC-funded multi-centre randomised controlled trials and other observational studies with a multidisciplinary team, extending nationally and internationally to New Zealand, Alaska, Malaysia, and Timor Leste.

Dr McCallum’s novel randomised controlled trials, and follow-up studies, are the world’s first trials on bronchiolitis in First Nations children. Her outcomes have been translated into changes for health policy to improve follow-up post-hospitalisation for bronchiolitis and directly into national and international bronchiolitis treatment guidelines. Her research has led to a paradigm shift in paediatric respiratory management of bronchiolitis across the Northern Territory. 

Dr McCallum’s passion for improving respiratory education led to developing and evaluating the first, First-Nations-specific educational flipcharts for common childhood respiratory conditions (bronchiolitis, pneumonia, bronchiectasis and asthma) that have been adapted to a multi-lingual mobile application “Lung Health for Kids”.
 

Dr Gabrielle McCallum
Email
Research Themes
  • Child and Maternal Health
  • Respiratory Health
     
  1. McCallum GB, Fong SM, Grimwood K, Nathan AM, Byrnes CA, Ooi MH, Nachiappan N, Saari N, Morris PS, Yeo TW, Ware RS, Elogius BW, Oguoma VM, Yerkovich ST, de Bruyne J, Lawrence KA, Lee B, Upham JW, Torzillo PJ, Chang AB. Extended Versus Standard Antibiotic Course Duration in Children <5 Years of Age Hospitalized With Community-acquired Pneumonia in High-risk Settings: Four-week Outcomes of a Multicenter, Double-blind, Parallel, Superiority Randomized Controlled Trial. Pediatr Infect Dis J. 2022 Jul 1;41:549-555. Epub 2022 Jun 7. PMID: 35476706.
  2. McCallum GB, Morris PS, Grimwood K, Maclennan C, White AV, Chatfield MD, Sloots TP, Mackay IM, Smith-Vaughan H, Mckay CC, Versteegh LA, Jacobsen N, Mobberley C, Byrnes CA, Chang AB. Three-weekly doses of azithromycin for Indigenous infants hospitalised with bronchiolitis: A multi-centre, randomised, placebo-controlled trial. Front Pediatr 2015;3.
  3. McCallum GB, Chatfield MD, Morris PS, Chang AB. Risk factors for adverse outcomes of Indigenous infants hospitalised with bronchiolitis. Pediatr Pulmonol 2016;51:613-23.
  4. McCallum GB, Plumb EJ, Morris PS, Chang AB. Antibiotics for persistent cough or wheeze following acute bronchiolitis in children. Cochrane Database Syst Rev 2017;8:CD009834.
  5. Singleton RJ, Valery PC, Morris PS, Byrnes CA, Grimwood K, Redding G, Torzillo PJ, McCallum GB, Chikoyak L, Mobberley C, Holman RC, Chang AB. Indigenous children from three countries with non-cystic fibrosis chronic suppurative lung disease/bronchiectasis. Pediatr Pulmonol 2014;49:189-200.
  6. Valery PC, Morris PS, Byrnes CA, Grimwood K, Torzillo PJ, Bauert PA, Masters IB, Diaz A, McCallum GB, Mobberley C, Tjhung I, Hare KM, Ware RS, Chang AB. Long-term azithromycin for Indigenous children with non-cystic-fibrosis bronchiectasis or chronic suppurative lung disease (Bronchiectasis Intervention Study): a multicentre, double-blind, randomised controlled trial. Lancet Respir Med 2013;8:610-20.
  7. McCallum GB, Binks MJ. The epidemiology of chronic suppurative lung disease and bronchiectasis in children and adolescents. Front Pediatr 2017;5.
  8. McCallum GB, Singleton RJ, Redding GJ, Grimwood K, Byrnes CA, Valery PC, Mobberley C, Oguoma VM, Eg KP, Morris PS, Chang AB. A decade on: Follow-up findings of Indigenous children with bronchiectasis. Pediatric Pulmonol 2020 55:975-85.
  9. McCallum GB, Oguoma VM, Versteegh LA, Wilson CA, Bauert P, Spain B, Chang AB. Comparison of Profiles of First Nations and non-First Nations children with bronchiectasis over two 5-Year periods in the Northern Territory, Australia. Chest 2021 Oct;160:1200-1210.
  10. Chang AB, Normansell R, Griwmood K, Alexopoulou E, Bell L, Boyd J, Bush A, Chalmers JD, Hill AT, Karadag B, Midulla F, McCallum GB, Powell Z, Snijders D, Song WJ, Tonia T, Wilson C, Zacharasiewicz A, Kantar A. European Respiratory Society guidelines for the management of children and adolescents with bronchiectasis. Eur Respir J 2021 Aug 26;58:2002990.

Read more at https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=mccallum%20GB&sort=date&pos=5

  1. Preventing infant wheeze and childhood asthma

    Preventing infant wheeze and childhood asthma

    Date

    A new $1.6 million Australian-UK world-first project aimed at preventing wheeze in preschool children and potentially asthma in later childhood by using an orally administered bacteria lysate to boost immune systems has been announced.

  2. Retail Pharmacy | What's app-ening with my lungs?

    Retail Pharmacy | What's app-ening with my lungs?

    Date

    Learning about healthy lungs has just become a lot easier for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families and health practitioners thanks to an expanded interactive app.

  3. NT News | Lung health app

    NT News | Lung health app

    Date

    Developed by the Menzies School of Health Research, the Lung Health for Kids app originally contained information on asthma but now includes the conditions bronchiolitis, pneumonia and bronchiectasis

  4. What’s app-ening with my lungs?

    What’s app-ening with my lungs?

    Date

    Learning about healthy lungs has just become a lot easier for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families and health practitioners thanks to an expanded interactive app.

  5. Menzies app improving asthma management in communities

    Menzies app improving asthma management in communities

    Date

    Education around asthma has gone mobile with Menzies School of Health Research’s Child Health Division developing an interactive app targeted to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families.

  6. NT News | Asthma app clears air on cure

    NT News | Asthma app clears air on cure

    Date

    Report on asthma app launch with Dr Gabrielle McCallum.

  7. Media Release | Improving knowledge and understanding of asthma for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families online

    Media Release | Improving knowledge and understanding of asthma for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families online

    Date

    Learning about asthma has just become a lot easier for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families and health practitioners thanks to a new interactive app

  8. Better child lung health

    Better child lung health

    Indigenous children living in remote communities with chest and lung conditions are a key priority for our child health respiratory team. To identify what can be done to improve their lung health and how their respiratory conditions can be better managed, the team extended previous...

  9. ABC online | Research targeting asthma and smoking

    ABC online | Research targeting asthma and smoking

    Date

    Indigenous smoking rates: Older kids a new tool to break cycle in Northern Territory. By Nancy Notzon. Senior research fellow Dr Gabrielle McCallum | A trial targeting improved asthma outcomes and creating an environment where it's cool not to take up smoking.

  10. ABC TV coverage of lung capacity study collaboration

    ABC TV coverage of lung capacity study collaboration

    Date

    Menzies have been out and about at the Northern Territory Rugby League Junior fixtures, measuring lung function in healthy young people. The study measures two types of lung function tests in healthy Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and young adults, to find the best range of healthy results. Which in turn will be used to help diagnose lung problems such as asthma. Dr Gabrielle McCallum manager of our Child Health Respiratory Program teamed up with with Queensland University of Technology PhD student Tamara Blake.

  11. $25k grant boosts lung researcher

    $25k grant boosts lung researcher

    Date

    A HEALTH researcher who is tackling some of the world's highest rates of respiratory disease in Aboriginal children in the Northern Territory has won a $25,000 national grant.

  12. 2015 Emerging Health Researcher Award winner announced

    2015 Emerging Health Researcher Award winner announced

    Date

    An inspiring health researcher working to identify ways to improve health outcomes in Indigenous communities has been named the Bupa Health Foundation Emerging Health Researcher of the Year.

  13. Researcher tackles NT respiratory disease

    Researcher tackles NT respiratory disease

    Date

    A health researcher who is tackling some of the world's highest rates of respiratory disease in indigenous children in the Northern Territory has won a $25,000 national grant to further her fight.

  14. Pioneering asthma education program and research in Darwin schools

    Pioneering asthma education program and research in Darwin schools

    Date

    An innovative asthma awareness and self-management program with tobacco uptake prevention funded by Asthma Australia’s National Research Program is being introduced to school students in Darwin.

  15. New talking posters to tackle chronic cough in Indigenous communities

    New talking posters to tackle chronic cough in Indigenous communities

    Date

    The launch of a series of flipcharts and talking posters will help to address factors that lead to chronic respiratory illness in remote Indigenous children and adults.

  16. My story: Gabrielle McCallum, nurse and PhD candidate

    My story: Gabrielle McCallum, nurse and PhD candidate

    Date

    Meet our winner of the 2012 NT Nursing and Midwifery Excellence Award for ‘Education, Research and Innovation’.