Melissa Hirth

Melissa completed her undergraduate OT course at La Trobe University, Melbourne in 1994, then her Master of Science (Major OT- Hand & Upper Limb Rehab.) at Curtin University, Perth in 2001. In 2021 Melissa completed her PhD at Monash University, Melbourne, undertaking her research on the ‘Relative Motion’ approach in hand therapy.

Melissa enjoys working in both private and public hand clinics. She has worked at Austin Health, for nearly 30 years, and in her own private practice alongside four plastic surgery colleagues for 25 years. She currently holds a clinical researcher role in hand therapy at Austin Health and is involved in several research projects in collaboration with the Plastics team. She is an external supervisor of a PhD candidate from Macquarie University, Sydney and a Masters student from the University of Limerick in Ireland. She juggles her work around the typical day-to-day running around of her two boys aged 5 and 6 years.

Melissa has a keen interest in acute hand injuries; particularly tendon repair and sports injuries, and has written 17 peer-reviewed published manuscripts, two book chapters, and has spoken as an invited speaker at several international and national hand surgery and therapy conferences and congresses.