Overview
News in brief
In March Tauranga Hospital was host to more than 150 doctors
who gathered for the Internal Medicine Society of Australia and
New Zealand (IMSANZ) NZ meeting.
IMSANZ represents more than 700 Consultant Physicians and
trainees in Internal Medicine (also known as General Medicine
or General and Acute Care Medicine) within Australia and New
Zealand.
A farewell function was held for
Director of Māori Health Services
Amohaere Tangitu last month who
retired from her position at the
DHB.
Chief Executive, Helen Mason.
Thanks to everyone who has taken the
time to share their stories in this issue of
Checkup.
When I read through your stories, what strikes me is a real
sense of pride people have in their work right across the
organisation. And the passion they have for making our DHB a
better place for our patients, and for their colleagues. From the
Telephony team, looking at ways it can improve its service, the
long list of staff undertaking further study which ultimately has
an impact on the health services we provide, to the staff who
made sure the Easter Bunny paid their colleagues a visit! The
list goes on. While these are all very different stories, I see our
CARE values reflected in each of them.
The section on feedback from our most recent Creating our
Culture staff and patient surveys shows how very important
our CARE values are to the environment we work in and the
health services we provide to our communities. It was great to
see feedback from staff saying the CARE values have helped
improve the quality of care, and to have an increase in patients
surveyed saying they were extremely satisfied with their care.
We are heading in the right direction and the feedback
shows we need to continue to work together to improve our
organisation and health services provided for our colleagues
and our patients.
As we head towards winter, it’s a good time to think about
what we all can do to keep ourselves well. Healthy eating and
exercise are key. I’ve also had my flu shot and encourage
you to take advantage of our free flu shot service for staff,
contractors and volunteers. I hope you stay well over winter.
Thanks to the Comms team for pulling together another great
edition of Checkup.
Helen
Amohaere was appointed to the
role in 2011 and has worked
tirelessly to ensure culturally
appropriate services for our
community.
Pictured: Amohaere speaking at her
farewell function held at Regional Māori Health, Whakatāne.
Obstetric Nurse Joy MacMillan retired last month after 46 years
working within the Maternity team at Tauranga Hospital. Joy was
the team’s longest serving nurse.
Efficacy of CPR: harder, faster,
deeper. Whakatāne based
Nurse Educator & Resuscitation
Coordinator Adele Ferguson and
Dr Aidan Ward provided a poster
presentation at the NZ Resus
2018 conference earlier this
month.
The conference held at Te Papa
in Wellington also celebrated the
first 21 years of the New Zealand
Resuscitation Council and was aptly named ‘Coming of Age’.
More than 30 junior doctors gathered at the Clinical School
earlier this month for our first Careers Fair. The event was
organised to help them make the difficult decision about what
area of medicine to proceed with. 18 specialists from Medical
and Surgical services, Mental Health, Women, Child and Family
services were on hand to share their experiences about why
they chose their area of expertise and how to proceed with
training. Many thanks to Clinical School Student Placement
Coordinator Leonie Alley for facilitating the use of the Clinical
School and organising the pizza!
Consultant Anaesthetist Pierre
Botha and House Officer, Isabella
Blunt.
Our front cover features Tauranga Hospital nurses Helen
Tuck and Kate Watts presenting a wreath at the ANZAC
Tauranga Civic Memorial Service.
2
Palliative Care Physician Prue
MacCullum and Medical Registrar
Ashley Fraser.