Tim Geraghty
Director, The Hopkins Centre
Career Profile
Tim Geraghty was Medical Chair, Division of Rehabilitation (DoR), Princess Alexandra Hospital (PAH), Metro South Health (MSH) for 18 years, with leadership responsibility for inpatient, outpatient and community rehabilitation services for acquired brain injury, spinal cord injury, persistent pain and other rehabilitation services, until he was appointed Director of The Hopkins Centre, a joint appointment between Griffith University and MSH, in April 2024. In 2017 he, along with Professors Elizabeth Kendall and Michele Foster, established The Hopkins Centre and he was previously Deputy Director (until June 2022) and Co-Director (until April 2024).
Tim is a rehabilitation medicine physician with 25 years’ experience as a leader/manager, clinician, researcher, educator and advocate in the fields of spinal cord injury (SCI), rehabilitation medicine and rehabilitation and disability. He received a Fellowship in the Australasian Faculty of Rehabilitation Medicine (Royal Australasian College of Physicians) in 1997. He has been a Staff Specialist in the Queensland Spinal Cord Injuries Service (QSCIS) for 25 years and was Director from 1999-2009. He continues as a part-time Senior Staff Specialist. In 2005, was pivotal in establishing the DoR, which specifically aimed to advance specialist statewide ABI and SCI services, persistent pain and other rehabilitation services in MSH and Queensland. His leadership was critical to the enhancements of these services over the past 20 years, through his enablement of translation of research and evaluation evidence into service implementation.
He has significant expertise and experience in collaboration and partnership building, strategic and operational planning and service development and implementation in rehabilitation medicine and rehabilitation services, at a hospital, health service and statewide level, with the ultimate aim of improving provision of services for people with disability. His leadership roles include: Acting Deputy Director Medical Services, PAH; Acting Director of Research, MSH; President, Australasian Faculty of Rehabilitation Medicine (AFRM), Royal Australasian College of Physicians; Chair of the AFRM Policy and Advocacy and Education Committees’ and President, Australia and New Zealand Spinal Cord Injury Society (ANZSCoS). He was instrumental in establishing the Queensland Statewide Rehabilitation Clinical Network and was one of the inaugural Co-Chairs and was also Clinical Lead, Brain and Spinal Cord Injury Project (Statewide ABI Rehabilitation Plan 2016-2026 implementation).
Research Expertise
Following completion of his rehabilitation medicine training in 1997, he undertook two years training as Clinical / Research Fellow in the Royal North Shore Hospital Spinal Injuries Unit (SIU), Sydney before returning to Brisbane. He has consistently participated in research activities, published and sought to expand his research skills and opportunities as well as promoted research within the Division of Rehabilitation and more broadly. While Director of the Spinal Injuries Unit (SIU), he pioneered participation in several national and multi-national clinical pharma trials - a first for the unit at that time. He was Co-CI, with Professor Alan Mackay-Sim, in establishing the Queensland Spinal Cord Injury Project which demonstrated, in a world’s first human trial, that autologous transplantation of olfactory ensheathing glial cells to repair the injured spinal cord, was safe and feasible. He established local Research Collaboratives to enhance inter-disciplinary research capacity which in 2015 culminated in the establishment of a Professorial position––a joint initiative with Griffith University and Motor Accident Insurance Commission (MAIC) and soon after led to the establishment of The Hopkins Centre.
Dr Geraghty undertakes research across a range of areas including rehabilitation medicine and rehabilitation, spinal cord injury, acquired brain injury, disability and health services research. He has been a co-investigator on national and international spinal cord injury research projects involving sleep, physical activity, acute SCI management and is co-author on a national position statement on exercise and SCI. Recent research focus through The Hopkins Centre has included rehabilitation trajectories, transitions and service access and the impact on outcomes for people with ABI and SCI, the Australian arm of the International SCI Community Survey, research capacity building and technology-enabled rehabilitation. His track record (71 publications, ~$24M funding) is evidence of excellent performance by a clinical researcher despite little dedicated research time. He received the academic title of Professor from Griffith University in 2014.
