Family doctor wins City of Fremantle Aspire Award

A family doctor with a passion for women’s and children’s health has been awarded the City of Fremantle Aspire Award for 2020.

In partnership with Business Events Perth, the City of Fremantle Aspire Award provides a $5000 scholarship to assist an individual’s personal and professional development through attendance at an overseas conference of their choice.

This year’s winner, Dr Ramya Raman, is a general practitioner and senior lecturer at the University of Notre Dame.

Dr Raman said she planned to use the scholarship to attend a major international medical conference in New Zealand later this year.

“The not-for-profit global association of family doctors is known as the World Organization of National Colleges, Academies and Academic Associations of General Practitioners and Family Physicians,” Dr Raman said.

“WONCA has 118 member organisations in 131 countries with membership more than 500, 000 family physicians and its Asia Pacific Region Conference is scheduled to be held in Auckland in November.

“I’m passionate about women’s health and empowering women to enable their best health and emotional wellbeing, so engaging in this session with other health specialists from various parts of the world will enable better clinical understandings and health outcomes.

“This is particularly important in light of the pandemic that we’re currently facing. There will be updates, public health discussions and opportunities for us to explore how we as family physicians can support our patients and community in the post COVID-19 pandemic.”

Fremantle Mayor Brad Pettitt said the Aspire Award was part of the City’s plan to raise Fremantle’s profile as a destination for business events and conferences.

“Business tourism can be a very lucrative market, so a key element in our Destination Marketing Strategic Plan is to attract more conferences and business events to Fremantle,” Mayor Pettitt said.

“By providing local professionals the opportunity to travel overseas to attend conferences it not only allows them to learn new things and network with other people in their field, it also gives them the chance to talk about Fremantle and what a great place it is to visit.

“And once we know about what organisations are out there and what events they hold, it gives us the chance to promote Fremantle to those organisations and bid for those events in future. This is going to be especially important as part of the post-COVID recovery.

“I wish Dr Raman all the best for the WONCA conference in New Zealand, and maybe at some point in the future we’ll be able to host the conference here in Fremantle.”

Business Events Perth Chief Executive Officer Gareth Martin said the organisation was delighted to recognise Dr Ramya’s work by helping her meet and connect with other family doctors and academics from around the world.

“Dr Raman’s work as a general practitioner in the field of women’s and children’s health is incredibly important to our society,” said Mr Martin.

“Attending business events like conferences helps experts like Dr Raman collaborate and exchange knowledge with others in their field and also showcase the expertise of Western Australia on an international stage.”

The City of Fremantle Aspire Award scholarship covers travel, accommodation and registration expenses.

Entry is open to all not-for-profit incorporated association members in the mining and resources, health, education, science and technology, business, environment and heritage, retail, and arts and culture industries, who either work or reside in the City of Fremantle.

The University of Notre Dame in Fremantle also sponsors an Aspire Award.

The winner of the University of Notre Dame Aspire Award for 2020 was teaching and learning coordinator Michelle Katavatis, who’ll use the award to attend the Blackboard World Conference.