Working mum of three Leonie Callaway has finished her PhD about obesity in pregnancy in Australia in record time —managing to juggle family, study and full-time work.
She finished her PhD in under three years (which normally takes three to four years full-time) and two nights before giving birth to her third child.
Part of her research through UQ’s School of Medicine, found that 35 percent of 11,500 women who delivered at Brisbane’s Mater Hospital between 1998 and 2002 were either overweight or obese.
Being overweight or obese increased the likelihood of diabetes and increased hospital stays and caesarean sections.
It is also associated with an increased risk of birth defects and longer stays for babies in neonatal intensive care units.
“Obesity and the delivery of obstetric care is an incredibly important public health problem,” Dr Callaway said.
She said all expecting mothers around Australia should be weighed and their data routinely collected as part of the perinatal data collection processes, to help with decisions about obesity in pregnancy as a public health issue.
“We went through a phase where weighing women was positively unfashionable.
“The midwives in the mid 1990’s said that it didn’t have anything to do with healthy babies so therefore you shouldn’t stress women by weighing them.
“But I think gradually, people are coming round to the idea that it might be a good idea to weigh women again.”
Dr Callaway said she finished her PhD so quickly because of her incredibly supportive husband Murray, in addition to having a supportive work environment, research funding, great advisors and very strict time management.
It also helped to have a research nurse, professional development leave and occasional housekeeper at home.
She broke her PhD up into “easily digestible chunks” and met her supervisor at least monthly with set goals and an agenda.
“Because I had two children at the time, I had very realistic ideas about why and what I was doing it for.
“And that was not to win a Nobel Prize. I wanted to be a clinical academic, with interests in teaching and research and I needed a PhD.
“When you break a thesis into tiny little bits and you’re strict about it every single month, it’s amazing how much you can get done.”
Dr Callaway, 37, from Kelvin Grove, started her PhD in mid 2004, following a year as a Fellow in obstetric medicine and endocrinology at the Mater and Princess Alexandra Hospitals.
During the initial phases of her PhD candidature, she received a National Health and Medical Research Council scholarship and also worked as a weekend locum physician at the Wesley Hospital.
In March 2005, she became a full-time staff specialist at the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital in internal and obstetric medicine and a clinical teaching coordinator for UQ.
Her findings have been published in high quality American journals with more research papers under consideration for publication.
MEDIA: Dr Callaway (0408 183 441, leonie_callaway@bigpond.com) or Miguel Holland at UQ Communications (3365 2619)
