Maree McCabe AM, Chief Executive Officer Dementia Australia, is a recognised leader, and brings extensive experience and expertise to the health, mental health and aged care sectors.

Her career accomplishments include leading the former federation of Alzheimer’s Australia to unify and become Dementia Australia.

Maree’s vision led to the development of internationally recognised, cutting edge, dementia education tools using computer games, virtual reality, artificial intelligence and innovative apps.

Maree is a member of commonwealth health and aged care sector committees, sector Boards and, a member of the Alzheimer’s Disease International Asia Pacific Regional Committee and Chair of the Nominations Committee.

On 14 June 2021 Maree was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia in the Queen’s Birthday Honours for significant service to people living with Alzheimer’s and Dementia, and to the aged care sector, and included in the COVID-19 Honour Roll for contribution in support of Australia’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Maree McCabe AM, CEO of Dementia Australia presents on the rising tide of cognitive impairment and the importance of mid cognitive impairment.

Professor Susan Kurrle is a geriatrician practising at Hornsby Ku-ring-gai Hospital in northern Sydney and at Batemans Bay and Moruya Hospitals in southern NSW. She is the Clinical Network Director for Rehabilitation and Aged Care in Northern Sydney Local Health District and she holds the Curran Chair in Health Care of Older People in the Faculty of Medicine and Health at the University of Sydney. Her research and practice interests centre on dementia and frailty, and she has developed memory clinics at Hornsby Ku-ring-gai Hospital and Batemans Bay Hospital, and leads a Clinical Drug Trials Centre in Dementia at Hornsby Hospital. She is also conducting research into intergenerational programs to improve care for older people in both residential care and the community Professor Kurrle presents here on mild cognitive impairment, the  history, concept, definition and evidence.

Professor Colin Masters has focused his career on research in Alzheimer’s disease and other neurodegenerative diseases, including Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. His work over the last 35 years is widely acknowledged as having had a major influence on Alzheimer’s disease research world-wide, particularly the collaborative studies conducted with Konrad Beyreuther in which they discovered the proteolytic neuronal origin of the Aβ amyloid protein which causes Alzheimer’s disease. This work has led to the continued development of diagnostics and therapeutic strategies. More recently, his focus has been on describing the natural history of Alzheimer’s disease as a necessary preparatory step for therapeutic disease modification.

Professor Masters is a Laureate Professor of Dementia Research at the Florey Institute, University of Melbourne and a consultant at the Royal Melbourne Hospital. His achievements have been recognised by the receipt of many international awards.

Professor Masters  presents here on the role of Amyloid and Tau in Alzheimer’s disease

Professor Christopher Rowe BMBS, FRACP, MD, FAANMS is a nuclear medicine physician and neurologist, with over 20 years of experience in dementia research and patient care. He is the Director of Molecular Imaging Research at Austin Health, Melbourne, Professorial Fellow University of Melbourne, a NHMRC Practitioner Fellow and is the inaugural Director of the Australian Dementia Network.

Professor Rowe presents here on mild cognitive impairment and diagnosis through imaging

Susan Kurrle is a geriatrician practising at Hornsby Ku-ring-gai Hospital in northern Sydney and at Batemans Bay and Moruya Hospitals in southern NSW. She is the Clinical Network Director for Rehabilitation and Aged Care in Northern Sydney Local Health District and she holds the Curran Chair in Health Care of Older People in the Faculty of Medicine and Health at the University of Sydney. Her research and practice interests centre on dementia and frailty, and she has developed memory clinics at Hornsby Ku-ring-gai Hospital and Batemans Bay Hospital, and leads a Clinical Drug Trials Centre in Dementia at Hornsby Hospital. She is also conducting research into intergenerational programs to improve care for older people in both residential care and the community.

 Professor Kurrle presents here on the course of mild cognitive impairment with a particular focus on patient case studies.

Professor Sharon Naismith is a Clinical Neuropsychologist, NHMRC Dementia Leadership Fellow and holds the Leonard P Ullman Chair in Psychology at the University of Sydney. She leads the Memory Clinics Initiative of the Australian Dementia Network (ADNeT) and the NHMRC Centre of Research Excellence to “Optimise Sleep in Brain Ageing and Neurodegeneration” (CogSleep CRE) and Heads the Healthy Brain Ageing Program at the University of Sydney. She is Chair of the Sydney Dementia Network, and Vice Chair of the Alzheimer’s Association International Sleep and Circadian Rhythms Professional Interest Area.

Her main interests are in dementia prevention specifically modifiable risk factors for dementia including sleep, depression, cardiovascular disease and cognitive inactivity.  She has published over 300 articles in the field. The quality of her work has been recognised by a Tall Poppy Award, the Society of Mental Health Research Oration the award of 3 consecutive NHMRC fellowships and the Australian Psychological Society Distinguished Contribution to Science award.

Professor Naismith presents here on benchtop memory tests that are available in practice.  

Professor Kaarin Anstey is an ARC Laureate Fellow in the School of Psychology at the University of New South Wales (UNSW). She is also Director of the UNSW Ageing Futures Institute, and a Senior Principal Research Scientist at Neuroscience Research Australia. Anstey also co-Directs the Australian Dementia Centre for Research Collaboration and is Chair of the International Research Network on Dementia Prevention.  Anstey’s research programs focus on the causes, consequences and prevention of cognitive ageing, dementia, and common mental disorders in adulthood. She leads the PATH Through Life cohort study that has followed a population-based sample for 20 years to examine risk factors for cognitive decline and dementia. Anstey led development of the ANU-ADRI risk score for Alzheimer’s disease and is an investigator on several multi-domain dementia risk reduction trials. She led the Body Brain Life project in Primary care and is a co-investigator on the Mind Your Brain Trial, the AUArrow trials. Kaarin’s second area of research focusses on how cognitive and sensory ageing impact driving in older adults. Anstey was a member of the WHO Guideline Development Committee for the Guidelines on Risk Reduction for Cognitive Decline and Dementia and is a member of the Governance Committee of the Global Council on Brain Health.

Professor Anstey is presenting on the latest evidence for lifestyle and dietary modifications for patients with mild cognitive impairment.

Professor Christopher Rowe BMBS, FRACP, MD, FAANMS is a nuclear medicine physician and neurologist, with over 20 years of experience in dementia research and patient care. He is the Director of Molecular Imaging Research at Austin Health, Melbourne, Professorial Fellow University of Melbourne, a NHMRC Practitioner Fellow and is the inaugural Director of the Australian Dementia Network.

Professor Rowe presents here on ADNet Screening, Step Up and the ADNeT Dementia clinical Quality Registry

Prof. dr. Philip Scheltens studied at the VU University Amsterdam, Netherlands, gaining his MD in 1984, and PhD in 1993. Clinical residencies in neurosurgery and neurology supported his academic development. He is Professor of Cognitive Neurology and Director of the Alzheimer Center at Amsterdam University Medical Centers and Honorary Professor at King’s College London. His main interests are early diagnosis, biomarkers, clinical trials and drug development. He has been the (inter)national PI for over 35 studies, including phase 1-3 multicenter clinical trials. He supervised >75 PhD theses since 2000. He founded the Dutch national plan against dementia and served as chair of the board. He is co-editor-in-chief of Alzheimer’s Research & Therapy and co-leads various EU projects, such as IMI-EPAD, IMI-AMYPAD, EMIF-AD, RADAR-AD, Euro-Fingers. He authored over 1000 peer reviewed papers and > 75 book chapters and co-edited several major text books.

He is member of the Royal Dutch Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW) and served as Secretary General until 2020. In 2016 he was awarded the European Grand Prix for Alzheimer’s Research. In 2020 he was Knighted in the Order of the Netherlands Lion by the King. Since January 2021 he is also managing partner of the LSP Dementia Fund.

Since July 2021 he is the chair of the international World Dementia Council. Professor Scheltens presents here on the latest evidence for the treatment of patients with mild cognitive impairment using a nutritional intervention.