Grand Designs: The PhD Edition
What if doing a doctorate was treated like building your dream home? Imagine a television show where the drama isn’t about concrete foundations or bespoke staircases, but about epistemological frameworks and ethics approval… Welcome to Grand Designs: The PhD Edition! Just like the iconic architectural series, but with the...
Written vs. Oral Communication: What’s the Difference?
Communication is central for allied health services. It is clearly important for speech and language pathologists, but communication skills are also important for occupational therapists, physiotherapists, psychologists, and many more. How these allied health professionals communicate and share information can make a real difference to services and outcomes. This...
What Does ‘Accessible Information’ Mean?
We use the word ‘access’ in lots of different ways. It can mean getting into a place, finding something, or being able to understand something. When we talk about accessible information, we’re mostly talking about how easy it is to understand and use information we get. Different types of...
Preparing and serving a meal: A metaphor for allied health reports
My research on allied health report-writing has focused on understanding the experiences of the readers and the writers of reports written for and about people with lifelong communication disability. I’m doing this to find ways for reports to be easier to read and understand, and possibly easier to write...
It’s not you, it’s the design: What a dress and a stranger taught me about health literacy
While dress shopping with my daughter recently, we found ourselves in a moment of shared joy trying on dresses and stepping out of our change rooms to admire each other’s choices. As I stood inspecting a dress that didn’t quite feel “right,” a kind stranger offered a compliment. I...
Lessons in allied health report-writing from the Administrative Review Tribunal of Australia
Sounds boring, I know, but the Administrative Review Tribunal of Australia might have just given allied health professionals the ‘play book’ on report writing. I asked Copilot to help me understand the important messages for allied health professionals who write reports for the NDIS. Let me know your thoughts?...
Rethinking Health Literacy: Moving Beyond “Low” and “High”
Health literacy is often described in binary terms: “low” or “high”, “limited” or “adequate.” While these labels may seem intuitive, they can oversimplify a complex and dynamic concept. It also risks placing the burden of health literacy on individuals, rather than prompting healthcare services, systems and professionals to reflect...
Speech Pathology Australia Conference 2025 presentation slides
These are the slides from my SPA 2025 presentation. DO NOT copy or reproduce these materials without permission. Contact me if you would like to arrange a workshop in your context or to be part of my research: harmony.m.turnbull@student.uts.edu.au...
Survey about reading allied health reports
I am doing research about written reports that allied health professional write about people with communication disability who have a lifelong disability. I want to know: This anonymous survey is for people who: The survey which should take approximately 20 minutes. Start the survey by using this link: https://redcap.link/AlliedHealthReports...
An international standard for plain language? Yes please!
Plain language definitions have been around for a long time and many governments and organisations have embraced it. An international standard now provides a consistent definition and agreed approach to implementing and measuring plain language in any context....