Doctor, lawyer, researcher, disability advocate
Dinesh Palipana is a doctor, lawyer, medical researcher, and disability advocate. Dinesh sustained a spinal cord injury from a motor vehicle accident in 2010, which caused quadriplegia, with the loss of feeling and use of his fingers, parts of his arms, and everything below the chest. He was the first medical graduate with quadriplegia in Queensland.
In 2019, Dinesh received an Order of Australia Medal. He was the 2021 Queensland Australian of the Year. He was the third Australian to receive the Henry Viscardi Achievement award in New York. Dinesh works at the busiest emergency department in Australia, in the Gold Coast University Hospital. He works on spinal cord injury research at Griffith University. He is a senior advisor to the Disability Royal Commission. In 2022, he was a model at Australian Fashion Week. Dinesh’s biography ‘Stronger’ was published in 2022.
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