Media releases

Federation University Australia graduate Dr James O’Brien has been awarded a major sports science award by the British Journal of Sports Medicine.

The Editor’s Choice Award in the Inaugural 2017 BJSM PhD Academy Award was presented to Dr O’Brien out of a highly competitive international field of recent PhD graduates.

His PhD, ‘Enhancing the implementation of injury prevention exercise programs in professional football’, was supervised by Professor Caroline Finch, Director of the Australian Collaboration for Research into Injury in Sport and its Prevention (ACRISP), and Associate Professor Warren Young.

“James was ACRISP’s first PhD graduate at FedUni and is now working at the Red Bull Soccer Academy in Salzburg, Austria,” Professor Finch said.

“He was an outstanding student and thoroughly deserves this award.”

Dr O’Brien said the primary aim of his research was to identify barriers to implementing successful injury prevention exercise programs.

“Injuries in football are common and have many negative impacts,” Dr O’Brien said.

“The benefits of injury prevention programs for football have been established in large scale randomised trials. Unfortunately, the reasons for low adoption and compliance are poorly understood and have received little research attention.

“My PhD aimed to address this gap by evaluating barriers and facilitators to implementation of these programs under real world conditions.”