For Dr Charlotte Slade, the longstanding partnership between WEHI and one of the country’s largest health providers, the Royal Melbourne Hospital (RMH), represents a collaboration like no other.

“The proximity is unparalleled,” Dr Slade says. “The hospital and research institute are literally across the road – or even just a corridor apart. The closeness changes everything.”

As an allergy and immunology clinician-scientist, Dr Slade often moves seamlessly between patients at the RMH and her research in the laboratories at the Snow Centre for Immune Health – a joint RMH-WEHI initiative in partnership with the Snow Medical Research Foundation – based at WEHI.

The short distance is critical, particularly for studying human immune cells, which must be processed quickly to remain viable for research.

“Some immune cells only survive for a few hours after a blood sample is taken, so getting them to WEHI immediately makes all the difference,” she says.

This swift transfer remains central to her research, allowing rapid input of clinical insights into laboratory discoveries.

“It’s an incredible ecosystem. The co-location of hospital and institute enables us to ask the right questions and pursue answers in the lab.”

Professor Peter Gibbs, head of Clinical Discovery and Translation at WEHI, says the fusion of clinical input and brilliant science is at the heart of the institute’s efforts to accelerate lab discoveries into ‘real-world’ healthcare solutions.

“When knowledge, insights and biospecimens can traverse the clinic and lab, and back again, the outcomes for patients are more valuable, meaningful and rapid,” he says.

Prof Gibbs, a WEHI lab head and senior medical oncologist at the Western Hospital, wears several hats as a clinician-scientist.

His team is pioneering the integration of population data from hospitals across Australia and internationally, with patient tissue-based research spanning multiple tumour types. Their insights are already helping fast-track clinical trials to establish circulating tumour DNA (ctDNA)– a simple blood test taken after cancer surgery – as a global tool for informing decisions on chemotherapy, dramatically improving patient outcomes.

Prof Gibbs is a passionate advocate for creating a medical research ecosystem that bridges the gap between the world of hospitals and that of medical research.

“To achieve new treatments and diagnostics, you need scientific discovery. And to make discovery purposeful, you need active engagement with clinicians and patients, always with an eye on practical medical applications.
Each informing the other means we get better results for patients.”

Prof Gibbs has a vision for a healthcare system where this integrated approach is also being powered by transformative new technologies.

“If discoveries and world-class tech can feed directly into innovative solutions for patients, then breakthroughs can turn more quickly into life-changing diagnostics and therapies,” he says.

He envisions a future that seamlessly combines clinical observations and analysis of human biospecimens with powerful new technologies like spatial omics and artificial intelligence.

In recent years, a strategic priority of WEHI has been to assemble a comprehensive suite of cutting-edge technologies that are among the very best worldwide. These so-called ‘omics’ technologies can scrutinise thousands of variables and visualise cellular interactions like never before.

The Colonial Foundation Diagnostics Centre unites WEHI’s spatial biology experts using these world-leading technologies, with insights from the RMH’s expert clinicians.

The centre aims to discover new tests and tools to diagnose inflammatory diseases, like rheumatoid arthritis and inflammatory bowel disease. Diagnoses that would have required extensive and invasiveclinical testing may be possible in a fraction of the time and with limited intervention.

WEHI’s partnership with the RMH spans decades. In fact, 2025 represents 110 years of working together to transform medical research. This incredible milestone has been marked by a new collaborative framework, aptly named WARMA (WEHI and RMH Alliance).

“This new initiative will stoke the fire and build a beacon for a best-practice partnership model,” says Prof Gibbs.

Two great examples of this emerging ‘blueprint’ partnership model are the Snow Centre for Immune Health and the Colonial Foundation Diagnostics Centre. Both are co-led by WEHI and the RMH and bring together multidisciplinary minds, pooling skills, insights and resources to achieve a common goal. Both world-leading research centres continue to strengthen the relationship between WEHI and the RMH.

WARMA is fostering clinician-scientist career pathways, making them more appealing and sustainable. The initiative plans to establish a comprehensive biobank for patient biospecimens and develop a digital research
environment.

“A future where we are collaborating closely with partners like the RMH means we can deliver better patient outcomes – working together, in a way that is greater than the sum of all our parts,” says Prof Gibbs.

“Clinical and medical research worlds are converging, leading to quicker, better patient results. And there are many minds to thank for the big steps already taken, including Professor Ian Wicks and Professor Clare Scott – former joint-heads of Clinical Discovery and Translation at WEHI.”

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Header image: Dr Charlotte Slade, laboratory head at WEHI, clinical immunologist at the RMH and co-deputy director of the Snow Centre for Immune Health.