Cassandra Szoeke

Professor Cassandra Szoeke PhD, FRACP, MBBS, BSc(Hons), GAICD, AMA, AFAIDH is a leading Australian researcher and practicing physician in internal medicine, with a sub-specialisation in neurology.
Szoeke is the Director of the Healthy Ageing Program at the University of Melbourne and principal investigator of the Women’s Healthy Ageing Project, which is the longest ongoing study of women's health in Australia.
==Education==
Szoeke earned her BSc(Hons) at the University of Melbourne, before completing her MBBS at Flinders University. She was awarded a PhD in Epidemiology by the department of Medicine at the University of Melbourne.
Her postdoctoral studies conducted between Stanford University and Duke University focused on Public Health and Policy with concurrent clinical training in cognition.
She became a fellow of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians in 2001, and graduated from the Australian Institute of Company Directors in 2014.
==Work==
For over 20 years, Szoeke has been the Director of Healthy Ageing Program at the University of Melbourne, which includes the Women’s Healthy Ageing Project – the longest ongoing study of women's health in Australia.
She serves as Councillor for the Australian Medical Association, Chief Medical Officer for the Australian Healthy Ageing Organisation and member of the National Council of Women of Australia (VIC). She is also Lead for the Asia Pacific node of the Women’s Brain Project.
She was involved in the steering committees for several major Australian collaborative studies including The Aspirin in Reducing Events in the Elderly (ASPREE) and the Australian Imaging, Biomarker & Lifestyle Flagship Study of Ageing (AIBL).
She is currently the Chief Editor of Frontiers of Global Women's Health and serves on the Editorial board of several other journals.
==Policy==
Szoeke informed the development of the National Women’s Health Strategy for 2020-30 in collaboration with Federal Department of Health and Aged Care from 2016, and has been referenced in major policy reports by the World Health Organisation, Alzheimer's Disease International, RACGP, Melbourne Academic Centre for Health, and the National Academies Institute of Medicine.
At a roundtable in 2020, Szoeke presented a Background Paper developed with the Australian Association of Gerontology, which was used to directly inform Australia’s Primary Health Care 10 Year Plan (2022–2032).
==Research==
In 2021, Szoeke published the Secrets of Women’s Healthy Ageing (2021), which shared lessons from thirty years of data on women's health and wellbeing from Women’s Healthy Ageing Project. The Educational Publishing awards Australia (EPAA) awarded the book a high commendation in the category of scholarly nonfiction book of the year.
======Sex differences======
Szoeke's research showing that hormone therapy may prevent or delay the onset of dementia was published as a chapter in the first book to examine sex and gender differences in Alzheimer's disease (Elsevier, 2021).
Her work as senior clinical author on a systematic analysis of dementia for the Global Burden of Disease Study in 2016 showed that more women had dementia than men at all ages, and was the first such work to report global prevalence of dementia by sex.
======Longitudinal research======
The longitudinal nature of Szoeke's Women’s Healthy Ageing Project has been recognised by the journal Menopause as "one of its greatest strengths" in understanding factors that contribute to the onset of dementia and other diseases over a lifespan. Szoeke's research demonstrates the benefits of targeting treatment towards women in midlife, as measures recorded over this stage are able to predict neuropathology decades later.
======Grandparenting======
An editorial published by Menopause noted Szoeke's senior-authored publication on grandparenting was the "first data documenting both positive and negative effects of grandparenting on women’s cognitive functioning in midlife... Such research is important given the magnitude of demand for caregiving not only for grandchildren but also for older family members and friends who are frail or ill".
======Health technologies======
Szoeke served as Clinical Lead on the development of the Brainy App, an initiative of Alzheimer’s Australia, in partnership with the Bupa Health Foundation running from 2011-2020. In the first days of release in Australia and New Zealand, it was the #1 ranked app across all categories. In February 2012, 180,000 Australians had installed BrainyApp on their iPhones, with over 1 million user engagements.
Category:Australian people
Category:University of Melbourne alumni
Category:Flinders University alumni
Category:Researchers
Category:Physicians