Giving back to my community

I am currently working for Te Whatu Ora-Taranaki at Hawera hospital in a rotational position – this means I get 6-months exposure to different clinical settings across the two hospitals.

My current role as an Occupational Therapist (OT) is spent working in the medical/rehab ward in the morning and in the community in the afternoon. On the hospital ward my role as an OT is to work with people who aren’t functioning as they normally would physically, due to injury or illness. The aim is to use their strengths and concerns to promote, restore and enable them to participate independently again within their daily occupations.

In the community setting my role is to visit people with health concerns and or a disability within their home environment to address their safety needs and support them to maintain their independence.
Treatment options are often provided in the form of education, modifications to their housing/ living environment and appropriate equipment.

Through schooling, it was always my aspiration to work towards becoming a teacher, I completed my level three and four early childhood educations via gateway class and went on develop an interest in working with children who have learning disabilities or who require extra support. 

Post completing this, my interest changed, and I discovered teaching and children was no longer my passion – I had a desire to work with people however unsure of the career and options. Through meeting with my careers counsellor and the support of Why Ora, I found occupational therapy and immediately knew this was where I wanted to go. 

Why Ora supported me through my studies across the three years, including applications to scholarships and also now within my working career as a qualified OT. I have such a passion to give back to my community as I have received so much support through my studies over the last few years that I wanted to return to Taranaki to give back to my people.

As a female who identifies as Māori and working within the health discipline, it is clear there are disproportions between numbers of Māori and non-Māori working in health, let alone female Māori working in health.

Through the eyes of Māori, the health system can also be perceived with a negative viewpoint.

My why is to give back to my community and give support through a Māori health care lens to benefit our people. Through my knowledge, identity and skill background, I hope to better educate our people on the importance of receiving health care and how important it is to look after our wairua.

It is a common occurrence that medical information is not presented or explained in a way we understand it, resulting in poor adherence to health recommendations and poor health outcomes.

I hope through my work, I can be that familiar face, listener and translator of medical jargon into our own way of understanding.