Clean sheet for safety at the FIFA Women's World Cup

Behind the scenes at this year's FIFA Women's World Cup, you’ll find countless people preparing to create one of the greatest sporting experiences to come to Australia. 

One of these is UTS alumna and FIFA Medical Coordinator Dr Donna Lu.

Donna applied to study a Bachelor of Human Movement at UTS on a whim. She knew sport and exercise came naturally, but she didn't know was how far it could take her. 

That whim set her on the path to where she is now. With a PhD under her belt, she's now responsible for organising medical services for all of the teams, spectators and workforce.

Keeping us safe at the World Cup

Whether it’s a paper cut, broken leg or a major catastrophic event, Donna is thinking of all the risks and ways to mitigate them.

“I set everything up so that medics can do their jobs. That might mean making sure the equipment is there or enabling contingencies when things don’t go to plan,” she says.

From a coaching internship with the Western Sydney Wanderers in her third undergraduate year at UTS to completing an embedded PhD with Football Australia, almost a decade of experience in football have helped her prepare for this moment.

Embedded in industry

An embedded PhD is a partnership between an industry partner and a university, where a student provides a service while using that data to inform their PhD research. 

In this case, Donna worked with Football Australia to monitor injuries.

“As an embedded PhD, you can identify industry issues which affect how you work. You understand all the nuances that can help ensure that your research has an impact,” Donna explains.

It’s incredibly rewarding to be able to implement your research findings and influence protocols and policies that affect the health and safety of hundreds of people.

Skills that last a lifetime

Donna’s success relies on the communication and coordination skills she built up through her work at Football Australia and tutoring UTS students.

“I never doubted my ability to take on the job because of my previous experience. From the get-go, I knew that it was the same role, just bigger and emphasised in other parts than I had done before," she says.

“I only fully realised recently how much my PhD prepared me for different situations in and out of academia. It has certainly aided the progression of my career especially as I start to engage more internationally.”

Monitoring injuries

At Football Australia, Donna surveyed people and profiled injuries in the professional league to ensure players were being treated appropriately. She also made sure medical teams were equipped with what they needed to do their job.

Donna’s work and PhD research at Football Australia was an experiment of sorts, but it has become apparent that the safety role is critical to the modern game. Her outputs have been picked up internationally.

“There was complete agreement in the FIFA Injury Consensus Group that there needs to be a role facilitating accurate and appropriate injury surveillance for all leagues across the world, and not just for professionals," she says.

“We hope that it also filters down all the way to community football as well.”

From injury prevention to pandemics

Donna found herself advising on much more than injuries at Football Australia, as unforeseen health challenges cropped up including bushfires, floods, COVID-19 and vaccinations.

“Research is very slow and no one in the industry really has time to read it. Part of my job was to try to find a way to communicate the most recent research into where it needed to be implemented,” she says.

“We had to engage with many other sporting bodies and associations to inform our protocols about health and safety, particularly when there was limited research."

“During the bushfires, I helped our sports doctors understand whether it was safe for players to train, particularly in environments where the air quality wasn't good."

“I also looked at the research during the pandemic and summarised it so that our Chief Medical Officer was at the forefront of the current situation and could make informed decisions.

Curiosity can take you places

Although the skills and experience she gained during her PhD have been key to Donna’s latest career success, graduate study wasn’t on her radar for a long time. 

According to Donna, the word ‘academia’ didn’t exist in her household when she was growing up.

“I grew up as a second-generation Chinese-Timorese Australian in south west Sydney. My parents didn't finish studying beyond Year 4, so education or academic careers were largely unknown to me. I didn't even know that the research pathway existed until my third year at UTS," she says.

When I realised that there was an academic pathway and researchers were having an impact on the community, I thought, I've got to do this! I can make a difference.

“It’s funny, to this day I still bring out Google Translate to help me explain what I do to my parents, but they're slowly understanding, especially the scale and impact of what I’m doing."

“It’s mind-boggling to be working with FIFA, let alone that very important people know my name because of my work or something that I’ve done. Asian parents are not the most affectionate kind but in their own subtle ways, I can tell mine are very proud,” she confides.

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