Jesia is the project manager for a nationwide project: Genomic testing pathways for precision medicine in cerebral palsy.Project synopsis: One in 700 children world-wide have cerebral palsy (CP), an often-debilitating permanent movement disorder. The national Australian CP Biobank (ACPB) comprises more than 500 families; systematic genomic sequencing revealed that at least one-quarter of children have an underlying genetic cause. A Medical Research Futures Fund Genomic Health Futures Mission (MRFF GHFM) project grant was recently awarded (2024-2027) to implement genomic testing pathways for children with, or at high risk of, CP. Five-hundred children will be recruited into the ACPB from NSW, Qld, Vic, WA and SA, either prospectively from early diagnosis clinics or retrospectively from cohort studies of early interventions. The project will combine genomic testing and extensive clinical assessment to provide early and accurate aetiological classification of CP. We will look for clinical and neuroimaging predictors of genetic aetiology. We will assess the value of implementing early genomic testing pathways, including the ‘value of knowing’ for a definitive diagnosis.Jesia has advanced skills in epidemiology and biostatistical analysis of healthcare databases. She collates clinical data into the national Australian Cerebral Palsy (CP) Biobank and works with a team of geneticists, who undertake whole exome/genome sequencing, epigenetic and functional studies to investigate the genetic causes of CP. She contributes as a member of the Australian Collaborative Cerebral Palsy Research Group to progress research into the aetiology of CP by providing clinical data analysis support and facilitating data linkage studies with cerebral palsy registers and other datasets. Jesia completed a Master of Public Health in 2008 and a PhD in 2013 with a thesis entitled: 'Postmarketing Vaccine Safety Surveillance Using Data Linkage: The Issue of Consent'. The research was funded by the Australian Research Council as one component of a Linkage Project grant entitled: Vaccine Assessment Using Linked Data (VALiD). The research output comprised four first author peer-reviewed journal papers.Jesia has been previously employed as a researcher in:- laboratory-based research for clinical drug trials; - hospital patient safety research; - injury-related topics - analysing national mortality and hospital morbidity data and producing AIHW reports and journal articles; and- the South Australian Early Childhood Data Demonstration Project - analysing linked anonymised administrative data spanning child health, education and welfare services for all children born in South Australia between 1999 and 2005, led by Prof John Lynch.A recent publication with a social media link (below):Since the early 2000s, researchers have searched for the genetic causes of cerebral palsy. One would expect these genetic studies to pay particular attention to using an accepted standard definition of cerebral palsy to avoid the risk of including cases who do not have cerebral palsy. In a systematic review of the scientific literature, it was found only 32% of genetic studies defined cerebral palsy using international guidelines, which is suboptimal. The main recommendation from this work led by Dr Jesia Berry and undertaken by Honours student Ryan Pham from the University of Adelaide’s Robinson Research Institute is for future genetic studies to follow international guidelines in defining and diagnosing cerebral palsy and report this at publication.