Health Matters: Working with Qualitative and Quantitative Methods. Melbourne, Australia
Christine Walker works with the Chronic Illness Alliance, in Melbourne, Australia. Christine specialises in qualitative research on health issues, but she has more recently began working with quantitative methods. In this profile Christine discusses her research on diabetes and epilepsy.
Dr Christine Walker
Chief Executive Officer of the Chronic Illness Alliance Inc.
Dr Christine Walker completed a PhD in sociology in 1996. Since then she has worked in the health field, specifically with the Chronic Illness Alliance, a peak body which aims to build a better focus in health policy and health services on the needs of people with chronic illnesses. Christine specialises in qualitative research which explores the experience of people with chronic illnesses.
Because the Alliance is unfunded it supports itself through consultancies, philanthropic grants and partnerships in research grants. Christine is currently a Chief Investigator in several NHMRC funded research grants, an associate in the Centre for Clinical Research Excellence in Diabetes and an associate in a Centre for Research Excellence in primary care.
Most recently, Christine has carried out a qualitative process evaluation of a randomised controlled trial of telephone coaching to explore the impact on the consumers involved in the trial; she has conducted an evaluation of a diabetes prevention program; and collected the views of people living with type 1 and 2 diabetes on how research can help improve their lives. She currently is completing a systematic review of the effectiveness of peer support and is working on the implications of living with multiple chronic conditions.
As well Christine has branched out into the world of quantitative research (with lots of help from her friends) and is now managing a longitudinal study of the social implications of living with epilepsy.
She has edited a textbook on chronic illness with other colleagues and recently edited two textbooks in collaboration with another researcher on the social implications of living with epilepsy.
Editorial Credits
Article copyright: © Christine Walker 2011. Published by Sociology At Work. All rights reserved.
Working Notes ISSN: 1838-5214
Article citation: Walker, C. (2011) ‘Health Matters: Working with Qualitative and Quantitative Methods. Melbourne, Australia,’ Working Notes, Issue 2, June, online resource: https://sociologyatwork.org/health-methods
Image credit: Hernandez, M. (2008) ‘Hope: Diabetes Supplies Art’, Flickr. Online resource last accessed 3 June 2011: http://www.flickr.com/photos/askmanny/2654340124/in/pool-78162295@N00/
The artist is Manny Hernandez, who was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes in late 2002. Hernandez describes his artwork: ‘These are used test strips and parts used while changing infusion sets for my insulin pump. The strips were just a few days’ worth of them. The other (pointy) items were a few months’ worth. Please join www.TuDiabetes.com – a social network for people touched by diabetes’.
Sociology at Work 