CONROD is the Centre of National Research on Disability and Rehabilitation Medicine. CONROD’s primary purpose is to advance research into the prevention, acute treatment, rehabilitation, social and vocational management of traumatically injured people.

The programme explores factors associated with poor or non-optimal recovery following injury and aims to develop and test improved rehabilitation strategies and outcome measures to enhance injury recovery. It encompasses the immediate post injury stage with the aim being to predict and prevent the development of chronic symptoms but also includes secondary and tertiary rehabilitation of traumatic injury.

The Acute Trauma team aims to improve the system of trauma care throughout the state in order to maximize recovery for injured Queenslanders. A major research arm of this programme is the statewide Queensland Trauma Registry which analyses trauma treatement at 15 hospital sites across the state. In addition, CONROD with other agencies, has supported the development of the National Trauma Registry Consortium (Australia and New Zealand), which benchmarks trauma care nationally and internationally.

This project investigates ways of reducing the economic losses attributed to road traffic crashes (RTCs) and analogous events. It aims to find ways of reducing the costs of injury, rehabilitation and disability, and to identify approaches that can improve the health and economic outcomes for injured Queenslanders.

Using behavioural science theories and methods, this programme explores psychological and social adjustment, quality of life and rehabilitation following injury in both adults and children. It aims to improve understanding of the experiences of those affected by trauma, prediction of improved outcomes, the ability to identify individuals at risk and development of high quality intervention strategies.

The programme focuses on ways of increasing resources and the capacity to effectively manage the consequences of disability for the community, organizations and individuals. The areas of research included are self management and personal agency, participation and community engagement, healthy workplaces and workforce capacity, effective and efficient systems and providers.