Prof Kelsey Hegarty

Kelsey Hegarty leads the Safer Families Centre of Research Excellence. Kelsey also holds the joint Chair in Family Violence Prevention at the University of Melbourne and the Royal Women's Hospital.

An academic general practitioner, her research includes the evidence base for interventions to prevent violence against women; educational and complex interventions around identification of domestic and family violence in primary care settings and early intervention with men, women and children exposed to abuse.

Kelsey focuses on interventions for delivery through health care and through the use of new technologies. The Composite Abuse Scale is a validated multidimensional measure of intimate partner abuse that she developed. It has been used extensively globally and is available in 10 languages.

Kelsey co-edited the book, Intimate Partner Abuse and Health Professionals and is on two Cochrane systematic reviews of screening and advocacy interventions for domestic violence. She led the development of Royal Australian College of General Practice White Book on Abuse and Violence and its associated GP learning module, and develops and teaches a range of curricula for health practitioners including domestic violence and mental health issues.

Providing regular expert advice to the World Health Organisation, Kelsey is also Director of the Postgraduate Primary Care Nursing Course in the Department of General Practice at The University of Melbourne. She works in general practice 1 session per week. 

For more information about Kelsey, including a list of her publications, click here. 

View Kelsey Hegarty’s University of Melbourne Find An Expert profile here.