Deborah van Gaans

School of Social Sciences

Faculty of Arts, Business, Law and Economics

I am a spatial scientist who uses Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to identify inequity in service accessibility. My research focus is to improve the quality of life for all people and in particular the disadvantaged.

My Research
Career
Publications
Professional Activities
Contact

Dr. van Gaans has over 25 years of experience in social science research. Her research is focused on improving the equity in health service provision through understanding the geographic and socio-economic aspects of accessibility. Deborah's innovative research has been undertaken in direct partnership with health service providers, state and federal government and community. Her research focus is to improve the quality of life for all people and in particular the disadvantaged. She has been acknowledged as a prominent national and international leader within the spatial industry. Dr. van Gaans has won peer reviewed excellence awards for her innovative health service modelling and was the recipient of the 2012 South Australian Spatial Excellence Community Contribution Award, 2014 South Australian Spatial Excellence Postgraduate Award, and the 2018 Geospatial World Excellence Award for the Application of Geospatial Technology in Health Services.

Appointments

Date Position Institution name
2017 - ongoing Research Fellow: Spatial Epidemiology University of South Australia

Date	Position	Institution name
2017 - ongoing	Research Fellow: Spatial Epidemiology	University of South Australia

Awards and Achievements

Date	Type	Title	Institution Name	Country	Amount
2019	Award	Asia-Pacific Spatial Excellence People & Community Award	Surveying and Spatial Sciences Institute	Australia	-
2018	Award	Geospatial World Excellence Award for Application of Geospatial Technology in Health Services.	Geospatial World forum	India	-
2015	Award	National Asia Pacific Spatial Excellence Award (APSEA) Finalist	-	Australia	-
2014	Award	South Australian Spatial Excellence Award (SASEA) Postgraduate Research Award	-	Australia	-
2012	Award	South Australian Spatial Excellence Award (SASEA) Community Contribution.	-	Australia	-
2007	Scholarship	Australian Research Council Postgraduate Award (Industry)	-	Australia	-

Education

Date	Institution name	Country	Title
2013	University of Adelaide, Adelaide	Australia	Doctor of Philosophy
2003	University of Adelaide, Adelaide	Australia	Masters of Applied Science
1990	University of Adelaide, Adelaide	Australia	Post Graduate Diploma of Applied Science
1989	Flinders University, Adelaide	Australia	Bachelor of Arts Degree

Research Interests

Geography Geospatial Information Systems Inequality studies Public Health and Health Services

Journals

Year	Citation
2022	van Gaans, D., Erny-Albrecht, K., & Tieman, J. (2022). Palliative Care Within the Primary Health Care Setting in Australia: A Scoping Review. Public Health Reviews, 43, 8 pages. DOI Scopus1
2019	van Gaans, D. A., Carroll, S., Coffee, N., Miles, C., Warner-Smith, M., Daniel, M., & Roder, D. (2019). A Comparison of Women's Travel to Mammography Services and Average Week Day Trip Length.. Journal of Research in Health Sciences, vol 4(1), 11 pages.
2019	van Gaans, D. A. (2019). The Accessibility of Australia's Rural and Remote Population Centres to Outpatient Cardiac Rehabilitation Centres.. Juniper Online Journal of Public Health, 4(3). DOI
2018	Dent, E., & van Gaans, D. A. (2018). Improving health care accessibility for older adults with frailty: the role of Geographical Information Systems. Aging Clinical and Experimental Research, 30(10), 1257-1258. DOI Scopus1 WoS1
2018	van Gaans, D. A., & Dent, E. (2018). Issues of accessibility to health services by older Australians: a review. Public Health Reviews, 39(1), 20-1-20-16. DOI Scopus78 WoS37 Europe PMC33
2017	van Gaans, D., & Tonkin, A. (2017). A survey of accessibility to Australia's Phase 2 Cardiac Rehabilitation Programs to patient barriers. Research in Health Sciences, 2(2), 162-184. DOI
2016	van Gaans, D., Hugo, G., & Tonkin, A. (2016). The development of a spatial model of accessibility to phase 2 cardiac rehabilitation programs. Journal of Spatial Science, 61(1), 217-231. DOI Scopus4 WoS4
2016	van Gaans, D., Ahmed, S., D’Onise, K., Moyon, J., Caughey, G., & McDermott, R. (2016). Modelling medications for public health research. Online Journal of Public Health Informatics, 8(2), 1-9. DOI
2016	van Gaans, D., Ahmed, S., D'Onise, K., Taylor, S., & McDermott, R. (2016). Managing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander data for public health research. Online Journal of Public Health Informatics, 8(3), e202-1-e202-8. DOI
2015	van Gaans, D., D'Onise, K., Cardone, T., & McDermott, R. (2015). The development of the Public Health Research Data Management System. Electronic Journal of Health Informatics, 9(1), e10. Scopus1 WoS1
2014	Clark, R., Coffee, N., Turner, D., Eckert, K., van Gaans, D., Wilkinson, D., . . . Tonkin, A. (2014). Access to cardiac rehabilitation does not equate to attendance. European Journal of Cardiovascular Nursing, 13(3), 235-242. DOI Scopus18 WoS17 Europe PMC12
2012	Coffee, N., Turner, D., Clark, R., Eckert, K., Coombe, D., Hugo, G., . . . Tonkin, A. (2012). Measuring national accessibility to cardiac services using geographic information systems. Applied Geography, 34(1), 445-455. DOI Scopus34 WoS32
2012	Clark, R., Coffee, N., Turner, D., Eckert, K., van Gaans, D., Wilkinson, D., . . . Tonkin, A. (2012). Application of geographic modeling techniques to quantify spatial access to health services before and after an acute cardiac event: The Cardiac Accessibility and Remoteness Index for Australia (ARIA) Project. Circulation, 125(16), 2006-2014. DOI Scopus59 WoS56 Europe PMC45
-	Gaans, D. V., Coffee, N., Daniel, M., & Roder, D. (n.d.). Breast Screen Service Characteristics as a Measure of Accessibility. Research in Health Science, 3(4), 103. DOI
-	van Gaans, D., Coffee, N., Niyonsenga, T., Miles, C., Warner-Smith, M., Daniel, M., . . . Weiss, D. J. (n.d.). The Use of Travel Time to Measure Geographic Accessibility to Breast Screening Services in New South Wales, Australia Short Paper. South Australian Geographical Journal, 115(1), 1-7. DOI

Conference Papers

Year	Citation
2011	Clark, R. A., Coffee, N., Eckert, K., Turner, D., & Tonkin, A. (2011). Cardiac ARIA: a geographic approach to measure accessibility to cardiac services in Australia before and after an acute cardiac event. In Australian Critical Care Vol. 24 (pp. 60). Melbourne, Vic.: Elsevier B.V.. DOI
2011	Clark, R. A., Coffee, N., Turner, D., Eckert, K., van Gaans, D., Stewart, S., . . . Tonkin, A. (2011). Access to cardiac rehabilitation and secondary prevention services in Australia: Is geography really the issue?. In Heart, Lung and Circulation Vol. 20 (pp. S6). Perth, WA: Elsevier. DOI
2010	Clark, R. A., Coffee, N., Eckert, K., Turner, D., Coombe, D., Lawrence, J., . . . Tonkin, A. (2010). Where not to have a heart attack in Australia!: The Cardiac ARIA Index. In Heart, Lung and Circulation Vol. 19 (pp. S159-S160). Adelaide, SA.: Elsevier. DOI
2010	Coffee, N., Clark, R., Eckert, K., Turner, D., Coombe, D., Lawrence, J., . . . Tonkin, A. (2010). Cardiac ARIA: Population Accessibility to 24h\7 Day Public Catheterisation Laboratories. In Heart, Lung and Circulation Vol. 19 (pp. S122-S123). Elsevier BV. DOI
2009	Clark, R. A., Wilkinson, D., Coffee, N., Eckert, K., Astles, P., Milligan, M., . . . Tonkin, A. (2009). Mapping services to support a patient's journey through evidence-based care pathways after a cardiac event. In Heart, Lung and Circulation Vol. 18 (pp. S266). Sydney, NSW: Elsevier. DOI

Conference Items

Year	Citation
2012	Clarke, R. A., Coffee, N., Turner, D., Eckert, K., Stewart, S., Wilkinson, D., . . . Tonkin, A. (2012). Can the Cardiac ARIA Index improve cardiac care for Australia's indigenous population?. Poster session presented at the meeting of Abstracts of the American Heart Association Scientific Sessions and Resuscitation Science Symposium, as published in Circulation. Los Angeles, CA: American Heart Association. DOI WoS1
2012	Clark, R., & Coffee, N. (2012). Can the Cardiac ARIA Index Improve Cardiac Care for Australia's Indigenous Population?. Poster session presented at the meeting of Abstracts of the 16th Annual Scientific Meeting, Heart Failure Society of America, as published in Journal of Cardiac Failure. Washington State Convention Center, Seattle, USA: Elsevier. DOI
2011	Clark, R. A., Coffee, N., Turner, D., Eckert, K., Stewart, S., Wilkinson, D., & Tonkin, A. M. (2011). Access to cardiac rehabilitation does not equate to attendance. Poster session presented at the meeting of Abstracts of the ESC Congress 2011, as published in European Heart Journal. Paris, France: Oxford University Press. DOI
2011	Coffee, N., Clark, R. A., Turner, D., Eckert, K., Smail, T., Stewart, S., . . . Tonkin, A. (2011). Cardiac ARIA: Measuring the nation’s access to PCI. Poster session presented at the meeting of Australian National Heart Foundation Conference. Melbourne Convention Centre, Australia.
2011	Coffee, N., Clark, R., Turner, D., Eckert, K., Stewart, S., van Gaans, D., . . . Tonkin, A. (2011). Cardiac ARIA: using GIS to measure the nation's access to cardiac catheter laboratories. Poster session presented at the meeting of IAG Conference 2011 Abstracts. University of Wollongong, Australia: Institute of Australian Geographers.
2010	Turner, D., Coffee, N., Clark, R., Eckert, K., Coombe, D., Lawrence, J., . . . Tonkin, A. (2010). Cardiac ARIA: a geographic accessibility model to cardiac services in Australia. Poster session presented at the meeting of Spatial Information Day (SID). Adelaide, South Australia.
2010	Clark, R. A., Coffee, N., Eckert, K., Turner, D., Coombe, D., Lawrence, J., . . . Tonkin, A. (2010). Cardiac ARIA: Where not to have a heart attack in Australia!. Poster session presented at the meeting of Heart Foundation, Heart Week Health Professional Forum. Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, Australia.
2010	Clark, R., Coffee, N., Turner, D., Eckert, K., Coombe, D., Bamford, E., . . . Tonkin, A. (2010). Where not to have a heart attack in Australia!. Poster session presented at the meeting of Proceedings of the 58th Annual Meeting of the Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand. Adelaide Convention Centre, Adelaide.
2009	Clark, R. A., Wilkinson, D., Coffee, N., Eckert, K., Astles, P., Milligan, M., . . . Tonkin, A. (2009). Cardiac ARIA: Measuring the accessibility to cardiovascular services in rural and remote Australia via applied geographical information systems (GIS) technology. Poster session presented at the meeting of Heart Foundation Conference. Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre, Australia.

Report for External Bodies

Year	Citation
2012	Clark, R. A., Coffee, N., Turner, D., Eckert, K., Bamford, E., van Gaans, D., . . . Tonkin, A. (2012). Cardiac ARIA Index: Measuring the accessibility to cardiovascular services in rural and remote Australia via applied geographic spatial technology: Report prepared on behalf of the Cardiac ARIA project. Brisbane, QLD: Queensland University of Technology.

Theses

Year Citation
2013 van Gaans, D. A. (2013). The Accessibility of Phase 2 Cardiac Rehabilitation Programs in Rural and Remote Australia.. (PhD Thesis, University of Adelaide).

Year	Citation
2013	van Gaans, D. A. (2013). The Accessibility of Phase 2 Cardiac Rehabilitation Programs in Rural and Remote Australia.. (PhD Thesis, University of Adelaide).

Memberships

Date Role Membership Country
2017 - ongoing Member Health Informatics Society of Australia Australia
Editorial Boards

Date Role Editorial Board Name Institution Country
2017 - ongoing Board Member Journal of Research in Health Sciences - -

Date	Role	Membership	Country
2017 - ongoing	Member	Health Informatics Society of Australia	Australia

Date	Role	Editorial Board Name	Institution	Country
2017 - ongoing	Board Member	Journal of Research in Health Sciences	-	-

Email: deborah.vangaans@adelaide.edu.au

Deborah van Gaans

Appointments

Awards and Achievements

Education

Research Interests

Journals

Conference Papers

Conference Items

Report for External Bodies

Theses

Memberships

Editorial Boards

Connect With Me

External Profiles