Since 2009, the RCH Auxiliaries have been supporting nursing excellence at the RCH through their generous funding support of the Dame Elisabeth Murdoch Nursing Development Scholarship. This year, Mellissa Short – the 2025 scholarship recipient and Donation Specialist Nurse at the RCH – is focused on helping the hospital better understand kidney organ donation in infants and overcome the barriers to saving more of our littlest lives.
Organ donation is a powerful act of compassion that can transform unimaginable loss into a lasting legacy. For bereaved families, knowing their loved one has given the gift of life to another patient can bring them a sense of comfort in their darkest moments.
Currently in Australia, kidney donation from babies under ten kilograms is extremely rare, and donations from infants under four kilograms are not accepted. With thanks to the scholarship, Mellissa will now pioneer a project which aims to give even the littlest donors the chance to provide other sick kids with a future once thought impossible.
In her day-to-day role, Mellissa coordinates the hospital’s organ donation and transplant program. Yet through her work supporting families during the most devastating moments of their lives, Mellissa has witnessed firsthand the heartbreaking gap in current transplant protocols.
“I’ve spoken with families who are experiencing the worst day of their lives – nothing worse can happen. And in that moment, they ask if their child can go on to help others by becoming an organ donor. Right now, we have to say no. I think that’s a real tragedy,” she said.
Having worked across both sides of donation and transplantation since the beginning of her career and now working primarily with families in these devastating situations, Mellissa knows there is a chance to make real, life-saving change for patients at the RCH and beyond. Her project aims to answer three critical questions: how many children could benefit each year, who this could help, and who could perform the transplantation in Australia.
“What this scholarship will allow me to do is understand and find a way to utilise these kidneys in Australia – firstly so families can create a legacy for their child in the form of helping another child live on, and secondly, help thousands of children currently on dialysis who could benefit from a transplant,” explains Mellissa.
With support from the scholarship, Mellissa will also visit transplant coordination centers in the US and UK, where similar programs are already established, to learn from international best practice and explore how these models could be adapted at the RCH. Mellissa believes that “by learning from these experts and observing best practice, we can develop the framework to enhance transplant opportunities for small donors at our great hospital and across Australia.”
This project will help to further enhance nursing excellence and innovation at the RCH, something Mellissa is incredibly proud of and indebted to the RCH Auxiliaries for helping to make this possible.
“I’m incredibly grateful for this scholarship – it will allow me to dedicate my time fully to this work and that means so much to me, because I know how much it will mean to families. In my experience, families genuinely want to help, and I believe this project will give them the opportunity to do just that,” Mellissa said.
About the Dame Elisabeth Murdoch Nursing Development Scholarship
First established in 2009 by the Auxiliaries Executive Committee (AEC), the Dame Elisabeth Murdoch Nursing Development Scholarship was created to advance the fine talent of nurses at the RCH, ensuring the hospital continues to be at the forefront of world class practice.
The scholarship is named in honour of the late Dame Elisabeth Murdoch AC DBE and recognises the wonderful contribution she has made to the RCH since 1933.
It is the largest scholarship available to nurses at the RCH, and each year, one nurse is awarded this prestigious scholarship to help further develop their career and change the future of paediatric healthcare.
Learn more about the scholarship