AFMW President Award recipient 2022, Dr Merrilyn Murnane AM has authored the book “Honourable Healers: Pioneering Women Doctor” which is based on the lives of the first medical women in Australia, Constance Stone, USA Elizabeth Blackwell and UK Elizabeth Garrett Anderson.
The book is sensitively written and thoroughly researched. Very little exists regarding Constance Stone’s life as she did not write a memoir. It seems that she and the founding members of the Victorian Medical Women’s Society were so busy establishing the Queen Victoria hospital from the St David’s church hall in the La Trobe Street Wesley church in Melbourne, that they didn’t document their journey for future generations. They just got on with serving the most vulnerable women and children in the community and little was known about them until Dr Merrilyn Murnane took an interest as a VMWS Past President.
Purchase of this book for Christmas would make a wonderful gift and spreads the knowledge about these Honourable Healers. We thank Dr Merrilyn Murnane AM for capturing their lives in this book.
To Purchase
Dr Murnane’s book is available to purchase here:
Royal Historical Society of Victoria
Australian Scholarly Publishing
Associate Professor Magdalena Simonis AM is the Immediate Past President of the AFMW (2020-2023), former President of VMWS (2013 & 2017-2020) and current AFMW National Coordinator (2024-2026). She is a full time clinician who also holds positions on several not for profit organisations, driven by her passion for bridging gaps across the health sector. She is a leading women’s health expert, keynote speaker, climate change and gender equity advocate and government advisor. Magda is member of The Australian Health Team contributing monthly articles.
Magdalena was awarded a lifetime membership of the RACGP for her contributions which include past chair of Women in General Practice, longstanding contribution to the RACGP Expert Committee Quality Care, the RACGP eHealth Expert Committee. She is regularly invited to comment on primary care research though mainstream and medical media and contributes articles on various health issues through newsGP and other publications.
Magdalena has represented the RACGP at senate enquiries and has worked on several National Health Framework reviews. She is author of the RACGP Guide on Female Genital Cosmetic Surgery and co-reviewer of the RACGP Red Book Women’s Health Chapter, and reviewer of the RACGP White book
Both an RACGP examiner and University examiner, she undertakes general practice research and is a GP Educator with the Safer Families Centre of Research Excellence, which develops education tools to assist the primary care sector identify, respond to and manage family violence . Roles outside of RACGP include the Strategy and Policy Committee for Breast Cancer Network Australia, Board Director of the Melbourne University Teaching Health Clinics and the elected GP representative to the AMA Federal Council. In 2022. she was award the AMA (Vic) Patrick Pritzwald-Steggman Award 2022, which celebrates a doctor who has made an exceptional contribution to the wellbeing of their colleagues and the community and was listed as Women’s Agenda 2022 finalist for Emerging Leader in Health.
Magdalena has presented at the United Nations as part of the Australian Assembly and was appointed the Australian representative to the World Health Organisation, World Assembly on COVID 19, by the Medical Women’s International Association (MWIA) in 2021. In 2023, A/Professor Simonis was included on the King’s COVID-19 Champion’s list and was also awarded a Member (AM) in the General Division for significant service to medicine through a range of roles and to women’s health.
