Kitty Foley

Kitty Foley is an Adjunct Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Health at Southern Cross University, where she serves as an AHPRA registered paediatric Occupational Therapist conducting research on health and wellbeing for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

Her academic credentials include:

• Bachelor of Science in Occupational Therapy (BSc(OT)) from Edith Cowan University
• PhD from Edith Cowan University

Dr. Foley specializes in Autism and Down syndrome research with emphasis on quality of life, participation, and physical health outcomes. She completed her PhD at the Telethon Kids Institute and held a Postdoctoral Research Fellowship at UNSW Sydney co-leading the Australian Longitudinal Study of Autism in Adults (ALSAA). Her work prioritizes co-production with the Autistic community and has directly influenced national policy through utilization in the Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect, and Exploitations of People with Disability and citation in the National Autism Strategy.

She actively supervises higher degree research students and maintains clinical engagement through her occupational therapy practice.