Professor Evonne Miller

Biography

Evonne Miller is Professor of Design Psychology at Queensland University of Technology and Director of the QUT Design Lab, where we reimagine and redesign the future.

She is the inaugural Queensland Health Research Chair in Healthcare Design, based at Clinical Excellence Queensland’s Healthcare Improvement Unit where she engages with consumers, clinicians, and community to collaboratively co-design creative solutions to improve healthcare.

Evonne is a recognised international thought leader in design for health, with expertise in design thinking, participatory co-design, co-production, futures thinking, and qualitative arts-based research and knowledge translation. To ensure lived experience informs and improves health service delivery, she works in close partnership with different populations: older people in residential aged care, people in prison, people and families with disabilities, chronic health conditions, and at end of life. In recognition of her contribution to the field of ageing, Evonne is a Fellow of the Australian Association of Gerontology (AAG) and was chair of the 56th annual conference in 2023. Her research also explores planetary health, specifically the design of the built environment, disaster planning, climate change engagement and everyday activism, and she is a member of QUT’s Centre for Climate Resilience.

Evonne has authored / co-authored 140+ academic publications, including 5 books (2 edited):

• How designers are transforming healthcare;
• Redesigning the Unremarkable;
• Creative Arts-Based Research in Aged Care: Photovoice, Photography and Poetry in Action;
• Creating Great Places: Evidence-based urban design for health and wellbeing
• How to be a design academic: from learning to leading

Recent funded projects, including 4 ARC grants & an NHMRC Ideas grant, include:

• Healthcare Excellence AcceLerator (HEAL, 2020-2023): a bridge between the QUT design and innovation community and QLD Health, HEAL accelerated healthcare improvement by integrated the creative energy and mindsets of ‘design thinking, design doing and design visioning’ across the state, with 35+ diverse projects across 12+ hospital and healthcare services (Queensland Health);
• Healthcare in Prison: evaluating how prisoners access unscheduled ‘over the counter’ (OTC) medications of paracetamol and ibuprofen, and redesigning the process by which prisoners request and access healthcare (QLD Office of Prisoner Health & Wellbeing) - which was awarded a global design accolade, as a named finalist at the 2022 SEGD (Society for Experiential Graphic Design) Global Design Awards.
• New Technologies in Aged Care: creating and evaluating arts-based training materials that engage, educate, and support aged care staff in deploying VR (philanthropic research grant from Facebook/Meta); testing usability and acceptance of an innovative automated bathing solution (Aged Care Research & Industry Innovation Australia);  the potential of 'chore' robots to perform routine tasks (showering, toileting, laundry, cleaning), freeing staff for social care  (QUT/Tanunda Lutheran Home); and co-designing an AI-app to provide real-time support to people who are grieving (Aurora – Your 3am Friend).
• Intergenerational living and learning: re-imagining senior living, through the co-location of retirement villages with high schools  (NHMRC Ideas Grant);
• Arts-based storytelling in aged care: how poetry, photograph, interactive art and card games engage policymakers, providers, and the public in a reflexive conversation about  aged care policy and practice (ARC Discovery Grant);
• Arts-based knowledge translation for Voluntary Assisted Dying (VAD): photography, audio and digital stories share the experiences of  Queenslanders accessing VAD, creating a safe space for dialogue and reflection on death, dying, and grief (Queensland Health)

Evonne is an experienced and dynamic workshop facilitator, leading 40+ design sprints and co-design workshops in healthcare on: pathways to virtual, connected, and integrated care, planning for the pandemic, reducing procedural pain, informal caregiving, palliative care, and mental health in the regions. In the spirit of open innovation, Evonne curates a growing repository of free resources to assist you in designing your own co-design sprint.

Many of these workshops were conducted as part of HEAL (2020-2023); as co-Director, Evonne led a team of 30+ design academics and students. HEAL was awarded 2 x Good Design Australia Awards in 2021 (‘service design’ & ‘social impact’); the QUT Vice-Chancellors Award for Partnerships (2021); the Queensland Health Award for Excellence in ‘Pursuing Innovation’ (2022); HEAL and the broader 'Bridge Labs' Program was acknowledged by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Observatory of Public Sector Innovation as a leading international exemplar of best practice.

In 2024, the redesign of the entertainment precinct on Level 6 at Queensland Children’s Hospital (QCH) with playful place-making and way-finding (rainforest decals, with parrots and feather imagery on the walls and floors to guide visitors) was awarded a prestigious A’Design award with the judge's praising 'the design’s integration of the hospital’s architecture and surrounding environment, as well as the unique co-design and interdisciplinary approach with stakeholders'.