Dr Naomi Katz (MBBS, BMedSci, DipML, FRACP, FAChPM, GDipBioethics) is a palliative care physician whose work sits at the intersection of clinical medicine, research, and education. She holds Fellowships with the Royal College of Physicians – Paediatrics and Child Health Division (2015) and the Australasian Chapter of Palliative Medicine (2017). Her substantive clinical appointments are at Alfred Health and Melbourne Health/Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, and she contributes to the after-hours roster for the statewide Victorian Paediatric Palliative Care Program. Naomi has an honorary appointment with the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, and an adjunct lecturer appointment at Monash University.
Naomi’s published work includes the chapter ‘Hope and Pediatric Illness’ in the Oxford Compendium of Hope (2025), and ‘Dissonance in views between parents and clinicians of children with serious illness: How can we bridge the gap?’ in the Journal of Paediatric and Child Health (2021). Naomi has also served as Specialist Contractor to the Curriculum Review Group for the renewed Paediatric Palliative Care Curriculum in (2023), and as Lead Author of the Progressive and Incurable Cancer section in the revised Adolescent and Young Adult Psychosocial Guidelines (2025).
Naomi is completing a qualitative PhD through the University of Melbourne. Her PhD seeks to better understand how parents contemplate their child’s prognosis (including the possibility of death), and how they experience hope, across their child’s illness. Naomi is excited to share learnings from her PhD, which while grounded in paediatrics, have relevance across the age spectrum.
