About / Board and Advisory Committee
Our Board of Directors
Susana Bluwol
– Founder and Board Director
Susana Bluwol is the Founder and Board Director of Bipolar Australia.
Ms Bluwol is an educator, speaker, and peer leader who has presented at national and international conferences and appeared on SBS radio and television. She founded Bipolar Australia in 2014, and continues to use her lived experience of bipolar disorder to guide the organisation’s work. As an immigrant from Argentina, Ms Bluwol has a special interest in incorporating insights from the multifamily therapeutic community model, which was originally developed in Buenos Aires during the 1960s, into Australian best practice for bipolar.
Assoc. Prof. Greg de Moore
– Director
Associate Professor Greg de Moore is a psychiatrist, historian and author. He is a consultant psychiatrist with Western Sydney local health district. Previously, in his roles as Director of Clinical Services, and as Director of Training he developed a keen interest in the welfare of junior doctors. He is also a Director of the Minds Count Foundation, which advocates for mental health welfare within the legal profession. In addition to his hospital work he is a consultant to Cricket Australia and Cricket NSW providing mental health assessment and care for players and staff. His 4 books include Tom Wills: the insubordinate life of an Australian sporting legend which blends mental health and Australian history, winning numerous awards and was short-listed for the National Biography Award. He is also co-author of Australia’s Game which documents the history of Australian Rules football from the mid-nineteenth century to the present; and Finding Sanity: John Cade, lithium and the taming of bipolar disorder, the story of Australia's greatest mental health achievement: the discovery of lithium for the treatment of bipolar disorder.
Vicki Katsifis
– Director
Vicki has been working in the mental health sector for 28 years. She started as a peer worker in the inpatient and community setting. Vicki ran recovery groups and one on one sessions. She shared her lived experience in a purposeful and authentic way. She worked in multicultural mental health both state and nationwide coordinating consumer advocacy groups, pioneering a Speakers Bureau and various projects such as a DVD and Theatre performance piece. She worked as a trainer at the Mental Health Coordinating Council and currently has a position as the Senior Peer Learning Advisor/Educator at the South Eastern Sydney Recovery and Wellbeing College. She also has her own business in peer supervision.
Vicki started her personal recovery journey in her 20s and had many challenges with personal and professional achievements along the way. In the early days of a diagnosis with bipolar disorder, she experienced stigma, isolation, unemployment, and a revolving door of hospital admissions. After 5 years of this she became employed as a peer worker and found purpose and routine in her life. She completed a diploma of counselling and diploma of community services and was focused on her nutrition and exercise and incorporating relaxation techniques at the end of the day. She is a featured author on “In our own words” book and spoke of the importance of authenticity in her life. It took many years for Vicki to speak her truth and develop her self-concept, so authenticity is her highest value.
Vicki continues to work in mental health and hopes to contribute to Bipolar Australia in a meaningful way.
Osvaldo (Michael) Bluwol
– Founding Member
Osvaldo Bluwol is a Founding Member of Bipolar Australia, its initial financial supporter, and the Honorary Secretary and Treasurer.
Born in Argentina, Michael migrated to Australia in 1983 as an Architect and worked in that field for a short time. He also held qualifications from the Ibero-American Conservatorium of Music and in 1987 obtained accreditation by the Australian Music Examinations Board and worked as a Piano, Theory and Musicianship Teacher as well as a performer and arranger. His third career change was in 1998 when he graduated from Macquarie University School of Law and set up his own practice as a Licensed Property Conveyancer. He is also the Principal of Rhodes IT, an e-commerce firm. Michael is experienced in law and finance; he established Bipolar Australia’s regulatory framework and since its inception in 2014, continues to provide his broad-based knowledge attending to the organisation’s secretarial, financial and legal requirements.
George Mavros
– Business Development Manager and Chairman of the Board
George is a family-oriented person with a strong spiritual foundation and an aptitude to make things happen; his temperament is commanding, rebellious, noble and magnetic. He has the ability to engross himself into a new business or community adventure or project at a moment’s notice. He has over 40 years’ experience as a Business and Life Coach and is the Managing Director of ETSI CONSULTING PTY LTD. George has assisted and supported not for profit organisations, or as he likes to refer to them, "Profit with a Purpose” organisations, for over 50 years.
He has worked with over 400 companies and trained in excess of 4,000 people in sales marketing and business development skills. His business career covers both SME and major corporations, involved in a variety of industries including but not limited to grocery, confectionery, stationery, hardware, chemical, pharmaceutical, professional services and government. He's been influential in the success of a variety of household brand names incorporating the extremities of the marketplace. Brands such as WD40, Armor All, Pampas Puff Pastries, Alcan Aluminium, Artline Marking Pens and Barilla Pastas and Spaghetti to name but a few.
In addition to this, George pursued tertiary business education and undertook various sales, marketing and motivational courses. He combines his tertiary and business experience, melded in with his life coaching, NLP and mentoring, learning to deliver a holistic solution to any challenge he is presented.
An author, with 5 business books published and 3 more on the way, he is the CEO of the Ross Hutchison Foundation and is part of the BNI Charity Collective whose mission is to assist charitable organisations to deliver better outcomes for their members. Apart from offering his services to Bipolar Australia, George is available as a keynote speaker and/or trainer for organisations who wish to support Bipolar Australia financially and welcomes direct contact on these offerings.
Bernard Mitchell
– Director
Bernard “Bernie” Mitchell was elected as a Director of Bipolar Australia in 2016, and currently serves as a member of the Advisory Committee.
Mr Mitchell is an author, speaker, and life coach whose autobiography “Bipolar: A Path to Acceptance” has a 4.5 star rating on Amazon.com.au. He has owned and operated successful businesses in the real estate and coaching industries. Mr Mitchell supports Bipolar Australia’s work by combining his professional expertise of business ownership with his personal lived experience of successfully managing mental health challenges.