News

Hāpai Te Hauora, the contract holder for National Tobacco Control Advocacy, congratulates Hon Dr Ayesha Verrall as the recipient of the tobacco control delegation in the allocation of health portfolios announced this week.

Finding balance as a midwife was a challenge for Wintec midwifery graduate Tamara Karu but she’s found the perfect mix, delivering childbirth education and working with whānau to deliver their babies.

The problem goes further than that, however. Last week it was revealed that the glacial pace at which the system functions has prevented any accurate evaluation of the progress that might, or might not have been made in reducing the rate of cot deaths, or sudden unexplained death in infancy (SUDI) as it is now known.

Faced with the worst cot death rate in the developed world, the NZ Government set a national target for reduction in 2017 and ramped up measures to prevent deaths. Three years on, is the Government on track? No one really knows.

The tragic death of a mokopuna has prompted a Taranaki couple to lend their weaving expertise to the district health board's newly named safe sleep programme Taranaki Tau te moe.

Powerful emotions and the holding back of tears were evident when a midwife spoke of the devastating impact of Foetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder (FASD) in Tairawhiti this month. Kaniwa Kupenga-Tamarama talked candidly of her experiences with the disorder at Turanga Health's Elgin hub on Wednesday — International FASD Awareness Day.

A ceremonial handover of the Te Papaioea Birthing Centre in Palmerston North this week will cement a new partnership heralded as the "gold standard" of maternity and postnatal care for all New Zealand.