Rate My Professor Hayley Thomas

Dr Hayley Thomas is a Clinical Senior Lecturer, Senior Research Fellow, and PhD candidate in the General Practice Clinical Unit within the Medical School at The University of Queensland. She holds a Bachelor of Science and a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery from The University of Queensland, along with Fellowship of the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (FRACGP). As a practicing general practitioner, she combines clinical work with academic responsibilities, including teaching medical students. Her research centers on whole person care in general practice, with a particular emphasis on the GP-patient relationship, factors influencing its provision, and the nature of holistic care approaches. She has conducted systematic reviews, such as the 2018 BMJ Open publication defining whole person care in the English language literature, and qualitative studies exploring general practitioners' views on Health Care Homes. Key publications include a 2020 series in the Australian Journal of General Practice on whole-person care, covering its nature, the doctor-patient relationship, and provision factors; a 2023 BMC Primary Care article on deep GP-patient relationships titled 'Where the joy comes from'; and a 2023 BMJ Open systematic review on whole person assessment for family medicine. More recently, her 2026 Frontiers in Psychology paper examines Christian religion and spirituality in eating disorder development, experience, and recovery.

Dr Thomas leads projects including 'Exploring security in the GP-Patient Relationship: A Qualitative Study' and an investigation into the experience of Christian spirituality in eating disorders, funded by a grant from The John Templeton Foundation. Her work contributes to understanding primary care dynamics, end-of-life conversations in general practice, and online teaching materials for medical students in general practice. Through collaborations with researchers like Megan Best, Geoffrey Mitchell, and Nancy Sturman, she has presented at conferences such as the Australasian Association for Academic Primary Care and published in high-impact journals, advancing knowledge in biomedical and clinical sciences, primary health care, and health services.