Professor Elif Ekinci

MAC.ROB Student, 1991-1994
PORTRAIT GALLERY INDUCTEE, 2017
MBBS, PhD
academe / medicine

Professor Elif Ekinci is a clinician scientist, an academic endocrinologist who is working to translate research into improved outcomes for people with type 1 and type 2 diabetes. Her research is focused on the pathophysiology, prevention, detection and treatment of diabetes and its complications in humans. She does this by undertaking observational studies and  clinical trials. She collaborates with basic scientists, engineers, people living with diabetes and other scientists to translate discoveries into solutions that can change clinical practice.

She is the Weary Dunlop Medical Research Foundation Professorial Fellow in Metabolic Medicine and Dame Kate Campbell Fellow at The University of Melbourne, Department of Medicine, Austin Health. The Dame Kate Campbell Fellowship is given to researchers recognising incredible contributions to the University of Melbourne for outstanding research and wider involvement in our local community and across the globe. She has supervised eight PhD students and is currently supervising nine PhD students and two masters students. She has almost 190 peer reviewed publications in the leading diabetes, obesity and metabolism journals and has an H index of 37. She has received multiple awards for her work, including the Australian Diabetes Society Ranji and Amara Wikramanayake Clinical Diabetes Research Award. She has had an accelerated career trajectory in the past five years, having had career disruptions to care for her three young children previously.

She is also the Head of Diabetes at Austin Health, where she coordinates the clinical care of inpatients and outpatients with diabetes. She heads diabetes and obesity clinical trials at Austin Health at the Centre for Research and Education in Diabetes and Obesity.

Professor Ekinci is the inaugural director of the Australian Centre for Accelerating Diabetes Innovations (ACADI). ACADI has been awarded $10m from the Australian Government and received over $13m in cash and in- kind support from its partners. Led out of the University of Melbourne, ACADI aims to deliver novel interventions for timely diagnosis, prevention and treatment of diabetes and its complications.