14th International Spark of Life (SOL) Conference
Thu 22 - Sat 24 May 2025
Pullman Melbourne on the Park
Invited Speakers
International Keynote Speakers
Professor Katie Dainty
Toronto, Canada
Professor Allan de Caen
Edmonton, Canada
Professor Allan de Caen is a Pediatric Intensive Care Consultant and Clinical Professor of Pediatrics at the Stollery Children's Hospital within the University of Alberta Hospital in Edmonton, Canada. His research/clinical interests include Resuscitation Medicine and Critical Care Transport Medicine. He has held leadership positions within the ILCOR (International Liaison Committee on Resuscitation) since 2003, and between 2005-2016 was ILCOR's Pediatric Task Force Co-chair, helping lead its systematic review process of the Pediatric Resuscitation literature. He has been part of the knowledge translation process into the "PALS" resuscitation guidelines for Heart and Stroke Canada and the American Heart Association (AHA) since 2003 and was the writing group chair for AHA's 2015 PALS guidelines.
Professor Robert Greif
Bern, Switzerland
Professor Robert Greif was born in Bozen, South Tyrol, Italy, in 1956 and went to school in Vienna, Austria. After studying medicine at the University of Vienna, Austria, Prof Greif specialised in anaesthesiology and intensive care medicine. Following a post-doc research fellowship at UCSF-San Francisco, CA, he became an associate professor at the Medical University of Vienna in 2002.
In 2004, he was recruited by the Bern University Hospital and the University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland; and he was promoted to professor at the University of Bern in 2009. Beside his engagement in clinical anaesthesia and patient care, his research focuses on airway management, resuscitation, and medical education. Attending the Master of Medical Education Program (University of Bern, CH) and the Clinical Teaching Facilitator Program (Stanford University Faculty Development Program, CA, USA) deepened his competences in medical education. Prof Greif covered the position of professor for medical education at the School of Medicine at the Sigmund Freud University in Vienna, Austria, from 2020 until 2024.
Prof Greif is emeritus professor of the Faculty of Medicine, University of Bern, Switzerland, as well as of the Medical School of the Sigmund Freud University in Vienna, Austria; and a fellow and honorary member of the European Resuscitation Council (ERC), where he served as the educational lead over 10 years; and a fellow and honorary member of the European Airway Management Society (EAMS). As past president of EAMS, he is leading its “Teach the Airway Teacher” (TAT) course. Prof Greif is the vice-president of the Cantonal Ethics Committee Bern, Editor-in-Chief of Trends in Anaesthesia and Critical Care, and editor of Resuscitation Plus.
Currently, he volunteers as the ERC Board Director of Guidelines and ILCOR as the Chair of ILCOR’s Task Force Education, Implementation, Team, and, in 2024/25 he is a visiting professor at the anaesthesia department at the University of Turin, Italy.
Professor Andy Lockey MBE
Halifax, United Kingdom
Professor Andy Lockey is a consultant in Emergency Medicine at Calderdale & Huddersfield NHS Trust and visiting professor in Emergency Medicine at the University of Huddersfield. Andy first became involved with Resuscitation Council UK (RCUK) in 1993, when he became an ALS Instructor, and he completed a three-year tenure as President of RCUK in December 2024. Andy has been an active member of the International Liaison Committee on Resuscitation (ILCOR) since 2010. His academic publications focus on the educational approach to resuscitation training.
Andy is a vocal advocate for training all children in CPR and defibrillator awareness. He was integral in the development of the European Restart a Heart initiative in 2013 and has led the RCUK Restart a Heart initiative since its inception in 2016 which has led to over 1 million children being trained in CPR. During this time, a parallel lobbying initiative in partnership with the British Heart Foundation, St John, and British Red Cross has resulted in CPR training becoming mandatory for all children in the UK. Andy also co-leads World Restart a Heart. He was awarded an MBE in the King’s inaugural New Year’s Honours list in 2023 for services to resuscitation training.
Professor Theresa Olasveengen
Oslo, Norway
Dr Olasveengen is a professor and intensivist at University of Oslo and Oslo University Hospital with a broad interest in cardiac arrest research, from qualitative studies in emergency medical dispatch to clinical studies, randomized trials and basic animal research. Current research is concentrated on how to protect the brain after cardiac arrest and other types of brain injury. She is also a member of the Science Advisory Committee for of the International Liaison Committee on Resuscitation (ILCOR) Basic Life Support task force, and volunteer with the European Resuscitation Council, working to evaluate our current knowledge base in resuscitation science and translate this knowledge into guidelines and education.
Don Harrison Perpetual Lecture
Professor Judith Finn
Perth, Australia
Professor Judith Finn, originally a critical care registered nurse, is the Director of the Prehospital, Resuscitation and Emergency Care Research Unit (PRECRU) at Curtin University, in Perth, WA. Prof Judith was the inaugural Director of the Australasian Resuscitation Outcomes Consortium (Aus-ROC) (2012-2017) and continues as a member of the Executive Committee. Aus-ROC has enabled the establishment of the Australian and New Zealand out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) Epistry – which includes data on all OHCA cases across the 10 Ambulance Services in Aus/NZ. Prof Judith has been involved with several pivotal clinical trials in OHCA, including the only two adrenalines in cardiac arrest RCTs.
Prof Judith has had a long-standing involvement with the Australian Resuscitation Council and is currently the Chair of the Western Australian Branch. She has also previously held leadership roles with the International Liaison Committee on Resuscitation (ILCOR), including the Education, Implementation & Teams (EIT) Taskforce Chair and as a member of the Scientific Advisory Committee. Her current role with PRECRU involves leading an interdisciplinary team with skills including linguistic analysis (emergency calls), spatial analysis (OHCA occurrence and AED placement), and epidemiology (analysis of St John WA OHCA data) – with the goal of informing strategies to improve survival after OHCA.
Contact Us
Conference Organiser:
Royal Australasian College of Surgeons
250-290 Spring Street, East Melbourne, VIC 3002 Australia
E: sol@surgeons.org
T: +61 3 9249 1158