Our board

Claire is a speech pathologist.
She has practised in the UK and Australia for more than 30 years.

Claire is passionate about helping people living with aphasia.

This is why she joined the AAA Board in 2018.
She is the Deputy Chair and was the Secretary before that.
She was also a member of the AAA Conference 2021 Committee.

Claire is a PhD student at The University of Queensland.
Her topic is aphasia awareness.

Kathryn has been a speech pathologist for 10 years.

She is passionate about community, connection and wellbeing for people living with aphasia.

She is studying her PhD at the Centre of Research Excellence in Aphasia Recovery and Rehabilitation.

Her research is about community aphasia groups.

Kathryn also co-led the first Sydney Aphasia Camp in 2023.

Dr Brooke Ryan is a Speech Pathologist who works at Curtin University in Western Australia.

Brooke is the treasurer for the AAA.

Brooke helps to run our AAA zoom groups.

Brooke organised the AAA conference in Perth in November 2023.

Kim is the secretary of the AAA.

She is an advocate for people with aphasia after stroke.

She is also a member of the Consumer Council for the Stroke Foundation.

Kim’s daughter Emma has aphasia.

Scott is an advocate for people with aphasia.

He has aphasia from a stroke.

Scott participates as a consumer representative to various hospital and health care services. He volunteers as a hospital ambassador.

Natalie is a teacher. She has more than 15 years of experience in mainstream, special education and university education.

Natalie was first diagnosed with primary progressive aphasia (PPA) in 2021.

She is passionate about representing people living with PPA, raising awareness of PPA, and helping people with communication challenges feel supported & heard!

Natalie is a member of the Dementia Australia Advisory Committee, the Alzheimers Disease International expert advisory panel, and is a research advisor for PPA researchers. Natalie is also an international speaker advocating for people living with Dementia & PPA.

Damir is a teacher, and advocate for people with aphasia.

He has aphasia following a brain injury.

He runs an aphasia coffee group in Townsville.

Rachelle is a speech pathologist. She has worked as a clinician and a researcher for over 15 years.

She now works for Queensland Health developing strategies and policies to improve healthcare and health research.

Rachelle enjoys working out ways to use technology to improve health care including services for people with aphasia.

Megan is a speech pathologist, and lecturer in speech pathology at the Australian Catholic University.

Her research focuses on making aphasia programs more sustainable.

Megan supports community-driven changes to improve aphasia services.