Pioneer Indigenous doctor wins top WA gong
Child and adolescent psychiatrist Professor Helen Milroy named WA Australian of the Year
The nation’s first recognised Indigenous medical doctor, psychiatrist Professor Helen Milroy, has been named Western Australia’s 2020 Australian of the Year.
A descendant of the Palyku people from WA’s Pilbara region, Professor Milroy became a doctor in 1983 and is one of Australia’s foremost child and adolescent psychiatrists.
That expertise led to her serving as a commissioner with the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse from 2013-17.
She currently serves as commissioner with the National Mental Health Commission and lectures in psychiatry at the University of Western Australia (UWA).
