Epidemiology of cerebrospinal fluid shunt surgery in Australia and New Zealand (2017-2024).

Spatial equity of physiotherapy accessibility in Aotearoa New Zealand in relation to Māori and Pacific ethnicity, socioeconomic deprivation, and rurality.

Evolving nursing roles in assisted dying services in New Zealand: A scoping review.

Decision-making capacity law developments in Aotearoa New Zealand

Gender Affects Operative Volume and Autonomy for Vascular Surgery Trainees in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand.

Background: A global and national shortage of midwives has made retaining the current workforce in Aotearoa New Zealand increasingly important. Understanding the contemporary workplace environment is essential for retention. Aim: To explore midwives' work environment in Aotearoa New Zealand over three consecutive years (2019-2021). Method: A cross-sectional study was undertaken using an online survey in three consecutive years (2019-2021). The survey gathered demographic data, paid and unpaid work data, work settings and working hours. The survey tools used to describe midwives’ workplace conditions were: Quantitative Workload Inventory, Job Satisfaction Scale, Pay Satisfaction Scale and Work-Life Balance Scale. Findings: The 1766 total participant responses, distributed sequentially across the three years as n = 758, 506 and 502, represented 18% of all registered midwives. Overall, the midwives reported high levels of job satisfaction but low levels of pay satisfaction. Assuming significance is p < .05, variance analyses identified that job satisfaction (Mean [M = 4.31; Standard Deviation [SD] 0.94), pay satisfaction (M = 2.53; SD 1.1), and work-life balance (M = 3.21; SD 1.10) were significantly higher and workload lower (M = 4.31; SD 1.12) for 2020 when compared to 2019 and 2021. Job satisfaction levels for caseloading midwives (M = 4.22; SD 0.9) and those in other mixed roles (M = 4.17; SD 1.01) were significantly higher than for midwives working in secondary (M = 3.81; SD 0.98) and tertiary (M = 3.77; SD 1.01) units. Quantitative Workload Inventory reported significantly higher mean scores for midwives working in tertiary (M = 5.35; SD 0.88) and secondary (M = 4.84; SD 1.03) settings when compared to those working in caseloading (M = 4.09; SD 1.05), primary unit (M = 4.19; SD 1.3) and other mixed role (M = 4.32; SD 1.24) settings. Conclusion: Overall, midwives reported high job satisfaction, but this was alongside high workloads and low pay satisfaction. When work settings were compared, midwives working in secondary and tertiary hospitals reported higher workloads and fewer working hours than those working in primary and other mixed role settings. High workloads and low job satisfaction are risks to workforce sustainability.

Donor conception that occurs outside of clinical fertility settings is understood to be increasingly common, yet research on this practice remains limited. Drawing on interviews with eleven participants, this study explored the motivations and experiences of same-sex and gender diverse couples who used known donors and home insemination methods to conceive. While participants were parents of children conceived after the introduction of the Human Assisted Reproductive Technology [HART] Act (2004) in Aotearoa New Zealand, conception outside regulated settings meant they were not subject to the medical, ethical, or legal procedures implicit within fertility clinics. Four main themes were identified (1) Finding the ‘ideal donor’- participants sought donors who were ‘good’ people; known donors were chosen to enable relational processes and facilitate ongoing connections, (2) Home insemination - perceived as affordable, personal, and offering greater agency; though revealing potential relational awkwardness, (3) Relationship planning/envisaged relationships: not the ‘donor dad’ - participants constructed donors as ‘helping uncles’ or extended family members with ongoing, contracted roles, (4) Lack of and need for knowledge, understanding and relevant support for self-insemination using known donors. This study highlights the need for accessible, evidence-based resources and psychosocial support to benefit and protect all donor conception stakeholders.

Background: As awareness of the possibilities for trans people to attain parenthood grows, trans, non-binary and other people with diverse genders are increasingly accessing perinatal care as part of their family-building journeys. International literature confirms that midwives can feel clinically challenged by, and poorly prepared for, working with pregnant trans people, but also that they are motivated to provide high quality care and desire professional support to do so. This two-phase study included interviews with trans people who were or had been pregnant, and/or whose partners were or had been pregnant, which informed the development of a nationwide perinatal care workforce survey. Aim: Phase Two aimed to identify current practice relating to inclusion, and the knowledge, beliefs and education needs of the perinatal care workforce in relation to working with pregnant trans people. Method: An online nationwide survey of perinatal care providers was undertaken in 2022. Data were collected through single- and multi-response questions, Likert scales and open-ended text boxes. Analyses included descriptive statistics and content analysis of open-text responses. Results: Of 476 respondents, this paper reports only the midwives’ responses (67%; n = 317). Fewer than 25% of midwives recalled receiving any specific education about providing culturally safe care for trans people, but most (78%) identified interest in accessing education if it were made available. Midwives are knowledgeable regarding some clinical aspects of gender affirming care, e.g., the effects of hormone therapy on fertility, but we identified some knowledge gaps. Most articulated positive attitudes towards caring for pregnant trans, takatāpui and intersex people but a minority raised concerns about what they perceived as the ‘erasure of women’ within wider efforts to be inclusive. Many noted workforce pressure as a barrier to progressing change. Conclusion: Some midwives are already implementing inclusive practices, primarily led by Lead Maternity Carers (LMCs) who champion affirming and inclusive community-based care. Ensuring that trans people and whānau can anticipate consistently affirming care when they engage in services beyond their LMC, particularly during hospital-based care, needs prioritisation as a workforce development strategy. To date, midwives have not been well prepared to provide inclusive care to this community, but they are willing to engage in education to support affirming and inclusive practice.

Globally, there is increasing need to address the burden of mental illness on populations, including youth, and increasing recognition of the role of social determinants on mental health. The study of resilience, as an ecological process of individual and community resource mobilisation in the face of adversity, is a promising lens through which to understand culturally and contextually relevant factors that enhance or inhibit mental wellbeing. This paper reports on a validation of a reduced, 2-factor, 17-item form of the child and youth resilience measure (CYRM-28) on a population of youth in Aotearoa (New Zealand) who were involved in multiple service systems, including child and adolescent mental health services. It builds on previous work which validated the full 28-item scale. It responds to needs articulated by researchers and service providers for a shortened version of the CYRM-28 that reduces assessment burdens on youth and clinicians. The reduced form may be helpful in mental health settings to quickly understand the resilience resources around vulnerable youth and support interventions that build on strengths and directly address areas where resources are missing.

This paper is written from a dual perspective — the author being both a policy researcher at the World Future Council and a professional musician. Building upon Arthur Schopenhauer’s view of music as a universal language, it argues that music-making is inherently a practice of relationship, capable of fostering connection across difference. Utilising Christopher Small’s concept of musicking as a verb, the paper reflects on music’s effects on social interaction, empathy, belonging, and community — through an interdisciplinary lens spanning embodied musical experience, contemporary Indigenous worldview, aesthetic and sociological frameworks, and empirical insights from neuroscience and psychology. Special focus is given to the teachings of the Moriori people of Aotearoa New Zealand — who practise peace as deep listening and view artists as intrinsic to this process, as illuminators of truth and agents of community healing. While acknowledging ever-present contextual caveats of power and agency, the paper calls for greater recognition of the arts — and their powerful capacity to foster safe, non-violent communities within education and community-building policy.

In extant literature, the bryozoan genus Chaperia Jullien, 1881 comprises 22 named species, seven of them solely fossil, with the two earliest temporal records dating from the New Zealand Oligocene. All but four of the putative extant species are confined to the Southern Hemisphere. A 2009 New Zealand checklist accepted three named indigenous Chaperia species (one of them misidentified), plus two yet-to-be named species and one other of uncertain identity. Restudy of this material, plus examination of Chaperia in new collections from throughout New Zealand’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) and the Norfolk Ridge, has yielded additional new species, such that 17 species of Chaperia are now recognised in the EEZ at the present day, 15 of them new to science. Vestigial ooecia have been found in all of the species and small, sparsely distributed adventitious avicularia have also been discovered in two of them. The taxonomic usefulness of the available morphological characters of Chaperia species is discussed, as is the status of all other putative extant species and their relationship to the Zealandian species. It is hypothesized that Chaperia evolved from an austral Chaperiopsis ancestor in the late Paleocene or Eocene.

Purpose This paper aims to evaluate the F.A.S.T. stroke social marketing campaign in Aotearoa New Zealand using a culturally responsive approach, examining how whanau (extended family) decision-making processes influence campaign effectiveness for Māori and Pacific communities. Design/methodology/approach A mixed-methods approach featuring a redesigned culturally responsive survey instrument was developed using He Awa Whiria (the braided rivers approach), integrating Māori and Western knowledge systems. The self-selection survey was completed by 1,859 respondents, including 441 Māori and 161 Pacific peoples. Findings The evaluation revealed that 32.7% of respondents used collective approaches to health decision-making. Māori (7.7%) and Pacific (5.3%) participants were significantly less likely than non-Māori non-Pacific respondents (12.1%) to report making decisions individually. While 87.5% of respondents understood the critical action of calling emergency services for suspected stroke, disparities persisted in campaign awareness, with non-Māori/non-Pacific respondents 1.6 times more likely to have unprompted recall of the campaign. Nevertheless, Pacific respondents demonstrated particularly positive emotional responses to campaign materials, with 49.1% feeling that they “yes definitely” feel more prepared to recognise stroke after viewing materials. Practical implications Social marketing campaigns and evaluations in Aotearoa New Zealand should focus on whānau rather than individuals alone, recognising distributed health literacy and collective decision-making within family systems. Campaign delivery strategies require refinement to ensure equitable reach across population groups, with particular attention to the “Take Action” component of the F.A.S.T. message, which showed poor recall across all groups. Social implications The whānau-centred evaluation approach challenges individualistic social marketing models and demonstrates how culturally responsive methods can generate more accurate insights into campaign effectiveness within Indigenous contexts. Originality/value This paper offers methodological innovations for more culturally responsive survey instrument design and conceptual contributions regarding collective health decision-making. By centring whānau and Indigenous perspectives, it presents a decolonising approach to social marketing research with relevance beyond Aotearoa New Zealand.

Inequities for Indigenous people in child protection systems are well established. One avenue for addressing these inequities is at the ‘front door’ of child protection, when reports are first made to statutory child protection services. This article reports on a formative evaluation of a shared decision-making forum in a small city in Aotearoa New Zealand, where a community Māori organisation meets to make initial decisions about reports together with the statutory agency. The aim is to improve information quality by bringing local, relational knowledge to the decision and provide a service response to those cases that are ‘closed’. The findings are that initial enablers were the policy context that emphasized community devolution, consensus on problems and aims, relationships between leaders in both organisations, and high community investment. Early challenges were a reluctance from some workers to engage in the process, lack of agreed processes, and fears of simply replicating the statutory agency in the community. Current enablers following a period of establishment were relationships of trust, the development of practice processes, commitment to review, increased information sharing, community location and leadership, and an alignment with practitioners’ values. Challenges were conflicts about moderate risk situations, lack of other key services, inconsistent attendance, and authority conflicts over legal mandates and information sharing practices, especially relating to high-acuity situations. The implications are that organisational, policy, and resourcing level changes and relationships from front-line workers to leaders are essential for moving institutional logics.

Approximately 80% of the incident haemodialysis (HD) population in Aotearoa New Zealand relies on HD catheters for vascular access; however, utilisation patterns and outcomes remain poorly characterised. We described the incidence and outcomes of HD catheters in Aotearoa New Zealand from the prospective data collected as part of the REDUcing the burden of dialysis Catheter ComplicaTIOns: a National approach (REDUCCTION) trial. We prospectively collected patient and catheter characteristics from adults (≥18 years) commencing acute or maintenance HD with an incident catheter between August 2018 and March 2020 across six Aotearoa New Zealand nephrology services. The primary outcome was adjudicated-confirmed HD catheter-related bloodstream infections (CRBSIs). Survival analysis using a Cox proportional hazards regression model was performed to determine independent risk factors for HD CRBSI. Among 894 patients (59 years (IQR 48-68), 58% male, 32% Māori), 1337 HD catheters were inserted corresponding to 157 142 catheter days. The confirmed HD CRBSI rate was 0.42/1000 catheter days (66 events). In the multivariable Cox regression, advancing age (HR 0.87 (95% CI 0.80, 0.95), P = 0.001) and tunnelled catheter use (HR 0.31 (0.13, 0.73), P = 0.007) were independently associated with lower HD CRBSI risk, while catheters inserted in operating theatres (HR 2.72 (1.08, 6.83), P = 0.03) were associated with increased infection risk. Methicillin-sensitive Staphylococcus aureus (39%) was the predominant pathogen in confirmed HD CRBSI events. This study represents the first prospective analysis of HD CRBSI rates in Aotearoa New Zealand nephrology services, revealing encouragingly low rates. Tunnelled catheters and advancing age demonstrated an independent protective factor against HD CRBSI, a finding that may be relevant when considering HD access in older patients.

Over the last three decades, scholars have produced a large body of work showcasing how people have engaged with the environments of Aotearoa New Zealand culturally, politically, intellectually, and economically. This diversity in perspective is perhaps best exemplified by the 2002 anthology Environmental Histories of New Zealand edited by Eric Pawson and Tom Brooking, and of which a new edition, Making a New Land: Environmental Histories of New Zealand, was published in 2013.[i] Nevertheless, there remain perspectives largely absent in New Zealand environmental historiography. Foremost among them are matters of toxins and toxicity. Indeed, while the Waitangi Tribunal has shed light on the impacts of toxins in some of its reports, for example how sewage discharge and industrial waste have polluted traditional fishing grounds, scholarship conducted outside the Waitangi Tribunal has been largely limited to expose the hypocrisy of marketing slogans like “100% Pure New Zealand” by showcasing how agricultural and industrial practices have polluted and continue to pollute lands, lakes and rivers.[ii] [i] Eric Pawson and Tom Brooking, eds., Environmental Histories of New Zealand (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 2002); Eric Pawson and Tom Brooking, eds., Making a New Land: Environmental Histories of New Zealand (Dunedin: Otago University Press, 2013). See also Tom Brooking, Eric Pawson, et. al., Seeds of Empire: The Environmental Transformation of New Zealand, new edition (London: Bloomsbury, 2020). [ii] See, for example: Jonathan West, “Mirrors on the Land: Histories of New Zealand Lakes,” Journal of New Zealand Studies NS30 (2020): 2-37; Catherine Knight, Beyond Manapouri: 50 Years of Environmental Politics in New Zealand (Christchurch: Canterbury University Press, 2018); Catherine Knight, New Zealand’s rivers: An Environmental History (Christchurch: Canterbury University Press); Terry Hearn, “Mining the quarry,” in Making a New Land: Environmental Histories of New Zealand, ed. Eric Pawson and Tom Brooking (Dunedin: Otago University Press, 2013), 106-121; Tom Brooking and Vaughan Wood, “The grassland revolution reconsidered,” in Making a New Land: Environmental Histories of New Zealand, ed. Eric Pawson and Tom Brooking (Dunedin: Otago University Press, 2013), 193-208; Nicola Wheen, “An updated history of New Zealand environmental law,” in Making a New Land: Environmental Histories of New Zealand, ed. Eric Pawson and Tom Brooking (Dunedin: Otago University Press, 2013), 277-292; Michael J. Stevens, “Ngāi Tahu and the ‘nature’ of Māori modernity,” in Making a New Land: Environmental Histories of New Zealand, ed. Eric Pawson and Tom Brooking (Dunedin: Otago University Press, 2013), 293-309. For instances where the Waitangi Tribunal have studied the impact of toxins, see, for example Waitangi Tribunal, The Report of the Waitangi Tribunal on the Motunui-Waitara claim (Wai 6), second edition (Wellington: The Tribunal, 1989) and Waitangi Tribunal, Report of the Waitangi Tribunal on the Manukau claim (Wai 8), second edition, (Wellington: The Tribunal, 1989).

In Aotearoa New Zealand, the government actively supports gambling through a preferential regulatory environment that facilitates ongoing, and increased, gambling operations. This article questions why preferential regulatory treatment exists for an activity that generates social harm. The article focuses on the Totalisator Agency Board New Zealand (TAB NZ) and the racing industry. TAB NZ has more regulatory concessions than the gambling sector in general, including through the tax system and self-regulation. There is an absence of transparency about both this support and the underlying assumption that increasing gambling to support the broader racing sector is desirable.

In this time of dramatic political, social, and economic upheaval, issues of citizenship have become ever-more salient. Questions around who is included in or excluded from a community, what rights and responsibilities should be associated with membership, and when, or if, it is appropriate to revoke membership, are at the centre of many heated debates.

Trauma remains a leading cause of morbidity and mortality globally, and New Zealand is no exception, with around 50 000 annual hospitalizations and over NZ$10 billion in associated economic burden. Despite the development of national systems such as the New Zealand National Trauma Network (NTN) and Trauma Registry (NZTR), geographical disparities and inequities in access to trauma care persist. This review aims to better understand the quantity and quality of trauma surgery research in New Zealand, as it remains essential to guide evidence-based improvements. A bibliometric analysis of trauma surgery research from 2000 to 2025 was conducted using PubMed and local databases. Studies were included if authored by New Zealand-affiliated researchers and utilized New Zealand data. Articles were classified by study type, design, institutional origin, and international collaboration. Descriptive statistics, linear regression, and univariate analyses were used to identify trends. From 3103 initial articles, 143 met the inclusion criteria. Clinical studies dominated (69.9%), followed by epidemiological and systematic reviews. Publication volume increased significantly after 2012 from 2.42 ± 1.78 in 2000-12 to 8.77 ± 5.70 in 2013-25 (p = 0.0018), aligning with the development of the NTN. Research output was concentrated in tertiary major trauma centers, although contributions from regional centers increased in later years. The mean number of authors per publication remained similar over time. New Zealand's trauma research output has grown steadily over the past 25 years, reflecting increasing interest and recognition of trauma surgery as a distinct specialty. Continued investment in infrastructure, training, and multidisciplinary research is vital to develop the trauma system further and support equitable, evidence-based care across all regions.

ABSTRACT Although dual language picturebooks are often viewed as a way for teachers to support the languages of instruction as well as the home languages of students, these books can also encourage global explorations of multilingualism. Research on teachers and multilingualism primarily focuses on changing teachers' beliefs and providing theoretical frameworks and instructional strategies to integrate children's home languages. Over the last 5 years we have built on this research in our work with children and teachers interacting with dual language picturebooks in a variety of educational contexts. In this article we present findings from a cross-cultural virtual professional learning opportunity for 11 experienced inservice teachers from the USA and Aotearoa New Zealand with strong multilingual backgrounds and experience supporting students' home languages in multilingual teaching contexts. Our findings show that engaging with dual language picturebooks in the workshops and in their classrooms encouraged teachers to develop awareness of how these picturebooks can be used to explore language diversity and develop awareness of languages beyond the classroom – to develop a stance of multilingualism. Teachers were intrigued with inquiries into language diversity through dual language picturebooks as a way to build this multilingual stance with students as well as themselves.

This paper interrogates the coloniality of (human) rights and inclusion by tracing their function within Aotearoa New Zealand’s education policy. Beginning from the global frame of Gaza, where human rights instruments are mobilised to obscure rather than prevent mass violence, the analysis demonstrates that rights frameworks are never neutral. In settler-colonial contexts, they operate as technologies of governance that both promise protection and reproduce dispossession. In Aotearoa, curricular and policy discourses of diversity, biculturalism, and inclusion similarly depoliticise the foundational violence of colonisation. By collapsing the distinct realities of Māori, Pasifika, refugee, and immigrant communities into state-managed categories, the education system sustains the hierarchies it claims to redress. For immigrant children, rights are extended only conditionally, tied to neoliberal benchmarks of economic utility and assimilation, while Māori rights remain constrained within Crown-defined parameters. Drawing on Wolfe’s theorisation of settler colonialism as a structure of elimination and decolonial theory, the paper argues that both Māori dispossession and immigrant conditionality are relational components of a single settler-colonial project. Education, rights, and inclusion thus function less as emancipatory frameworks than as instruments for managing populations and consolidating white settler sovereignty.