The principal scientific journal for the profession in New Zealand

Rosemary Stamm, Kristina Aluzaite, Malcolm Arnold, Thomas Caspritz, Campbell White, Michael Schultz

Challenges for the future: the gastroenterology specialist workforce in New Zealand

New Zealand’s healthcare system is funded by government garnered taxes and offers a comprehensive set of free core health services to all New Zealanders as well as those who live in New Zealand and hold a residency or work visa.

Dianne Vicary, Colin Hutchison, Trudi Aspden

Preventing acute kidney injury: assessing awareness to temporarily discontinue ‘at-risk’ medicines during acute illness in a New Zealand cohort

Acute kidney injury (AKI) is an increasingly common clinical problem affecting kidney structure and function, and is defined as an abrupt onset of renal dysfunction ranging from minor loss of function to organ failure.

Aakash V Chhibber, Sharmini Muttaiyah, Gary McAuliffe, Shivani Fox-Lewis, Mary De Almeida, Matthew Blakiston, Veronica Playle, Andrew Fox-Lewis, Sally Roberts

Age-related differences in SARS-CoV-2 testing in the Northern Region of New Zealand | OPEN ACCESS

New Zealand’s first case of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) due to severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) was confirmed on 28 February 2020 at Auckland City Hospital in an adult who had recently travelled overseas.

Shivani Fox-Lewis, Sharmini Muttaiyah, Fahimeh Rahnama, Gary McAuliffe, Sally Roberts

An understanding of discordant SARS-CoV-2 test results: an examination of the data from a central Auckland laboratory | OPEN ACCESS

SARS-CoV-2 is the causative agent of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has infected over seven million people worldwide (data accessed on 8 June), with 1,504 cases in New Zealand.

Erin Horsfall, Ed Gane, Ahmad Anwar, Chris Moyes, Alex Lampen-Smith, Susan Hay, Chris Cunningham

Chronic hepatitis B infection—an unmet medical need in New Zealand 35 years after universal neonatal vaccination

Chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection is a recognised global health priority and in 2016 the World Health Organisation (WHO) adopted the first-ever global hepatitis strategy to eliminate viral hepatitis as a public health threat by 2030.

James E Ussher, Gary N McAuliffe, Juliet A Elvy, TRIME auditors, Arlo Upton

Appropriateness of trimethoprim as empiric treatment for cystitis in 15–55 year-old women: an audit

Cystitis is a common presentation in primary care. Uncomplicated cystitis is defined as occurring in females with a normal urinary tract.

Mark F Zhu, David S Musson, Jacob T Munro

Hip abductor tendon tears—a survey of New Zealand orthopaedic surgeons

Hip abductor tendon tears are a common cause of greater trochanteric pain syndrome, affecting up to 20% of those over the age of 50.

Charles Yao-Cheng Ho, Mildred Lee, Chris Nunn, Jonathon White, Andrew J Kerr, on behalf of the ANZACS-QI investigators

Atrial fibrillation in acute coronary syndrome: patient characteristics and appropriate utilisation of anti-thrombotic therapy in New Zealand (ANZACS-QI 39)

Atrial fibrillation (AF), the most commonly encountered clinical arrhythmia, often coexists with acute coronary syndrome (ACS).

Katherine Bloomfield, Marcus Lau, Martin J Connolly

Falls risk factor assessment and secondary prevention in the older old

Falls are common in older adults with half of community-dwelling people aged 80 years and over experiencing a fall in one year.

Kate Reid, Ray Kirk, Pauline Barnett, Ann Richardson, Annabel Ahuriri-Driscoll

VOICES: South Island pilot survey of bereaved people

From 2016–2038, the number of people dying in New Zealand is predicted to increase by almost 50%. These projections indicate that palliative care requirements will increase by 37.5% in public hospitals, 84.2% in aged residential care (ARC) and 51.8% in hospice care.

Has the present government delivered the health policy that it promised before it was elected?

The health issue of today is clearly the COVID-19 pandemic and the New Zealand response. At the time of writing most New Zealanders will rightly feel proud of our response to the pandemic and the effect of this response on the ability of our health system to function as it does.

Invest in prevention to improve child oral health in the long-term

Jonathan M Broadbent

In this issue of the New Zealand Medical Journal, Schluter, Kokaua and Lee characterise the prevalence of severe early childhood (S-ECC) caries among five-year-olds seen in Canterbury District Health Board’s Community Oral Health Service as an epidemic.

Amanda Kvalsvig, Nick Wilson, Ling Chan, Sophie Febery, Sally Roberts, Bryan Betty, Michael G Baker

Mass masking: an alternative to a second lockdown in Aotearoa | OPEN ACCESS

Aotearoa New Zealand succeeded in eliminating COVID-19, but this success has been challenged by poor management of cases at the border in mid-June 2020.

Richard Edwards, Janet Hoek, Andrew Waa

E-cigarettes, vaping and a Smokefree Aotearoa: where to next? | OPEN ACCESS

This edition of the Journal includes a commentary by Burrowes et al discussing the validity of the claim that e-cigarettes are 95% safer than smoking.

Vol 133 No 1516: 12 June 2020

Why are alcohol companies in our schools?

Jennie Connor

In a recent Viewpoint article, Nicki Jackson and Rachael Dixon examined a high school alcohol education programme called “Smashed” from public health and health education perspectives.

Vol 133 No 1515: 22 May 2020

The Government’s proposal to legalise cannabis in New Zealand: 10 key questions

Chris Wilkins, Marta Rychert

A national referendum on the legal status of recreational cannabis use and supply in New Zealand will be held at the next general election in September 2020.

Vol 133 No 1514: 8 May 2020

While we have your attention… | OPEN ACCESS

Felicity Dumble, Jim Miller, Maria Poynter, Phil Shoemack

In normal times, public health professionals work in the background to ensure that the myriad health risks faced by our population do not see the light of day. Pandemics and other major outbreaks or health emergencies remind the public of the importance of public health services.

Is there a syndrome caused by radiofrequency electromagnetic fields?

Mark Elwood

It is claimed that exposure to radiofrequency fields (RF) produces a ‘microwave syndrome’, characterised by ‘sleep disturbance/insomnia, headache, depression/depressive symptoms, fatigue/tiredness, dysesthesia, concentration/attention dysfunction, memory changes, dizziness, irritability, loss of appetite/body weight, restlessness/anxiety, nausea, skin burning/tingling/dermographism and EEG changes’.

Benedikt Fischer, Dimitri Daldegan-Bueno

New Zealand’s ‘Cannabis Legalisation and Regulation Bill’: an evidence-based assessment and critique of essential regulatory components towards policy outcomes | OPEN ACCESS

New Zealand features relatively high cannabis use rates in global comparison, while presently considering fundamental reform of its present, prohibition-based cannabis control approach towards legalisation of cannabis use and supply.

Martin S Brook, Philippa M Black, Jennifer Salmond, Kim N Dirks, Terri-Ann Berry, Gregor Steinhorn

Erionite in Auckland bedrock and malignant mesothelioma: an emerging public and occupational health hazard? | OPEN ACCESS

Asbestos-induced malignant mesothelioma (MM) is of worldwide concern but particularly in New Zealand. The highest mesothelioma incidence is in the construction and building trades.

Kelly S Burrowes, Lutz Beckert, Stuart Jones

Human lungs are created to breathe clean air: the questionable quantification of vaping safety “95% less harmful”

It is projected that smoking will kill one billion people worldwide this century. Up to two-thirds of those who smoke will die prematurely due to smoking.

Bruce Hamilton, Lynley Anderson, Nat Anglem, Stuart Armstrong, Simon Baker, Sarah Beable, Peter Burt, Lynne Coleman, Rob Doughty, Tony Edwards, Dan Exeter, Mark Fulcher, Stephen Kara, John Mayhew, Sam Mayhew, Chris Milne, Brendan O’Neill, Hamish Osborne, Melinda Parnell, Jake Pearson, Karen Rasmussen, Judikje Scheffer, Martin Swan, Mark Thomas, David Gerrard

Medical considerations for supporting elite athletes during the post-peak phase of the New Zealand COVID-19 pandemic: a New Zealand sporting code consensus | OPEN ACCESS

In late December 2019, a cluster of atypical pneumonia cases in Wuhan China resulted in the identification of novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 and a disease known as COVID-19.

Vol 133 No 1516: 12 June 2020

The 2019 Global Health Security Index (GHSI) and its implications for New Zealand and Pacific regional health security | OPEN ACCESS

Matt Boyd, Michael G Baker, Cassidy Nelson, Nick Wilson

Recent events such as the 2019 measles epidemic in New Zealand and the South Pacific, as well as the emergence of a novel coronavirus in China in 2019 (COVID-19), underscore that all countries must ensure capabilities to prevent, detect and rapidly respond to public health emergencies.

Vol 133 No 1515: 22 May 2020

The practice of the alcohol industry as health educator: a critique

Nicki Jackson, Rachael Dixon

Due to typically heavy patterns of drinking as well as differences in alcohol sensitivities and risk-taking behaviours, adolescents experience disproportionately more harm from their drinking than older drinkers.

Lukas Marek, Jesse Wiki, Malcolm Campbell, Simon Kingham, Clive Sabel, Melanie Tomintz, Matthew Hobbs

Slipping under the radar: worsened health outcomes in semi-urban areas of New Zealand

Persistent inequities in health outcomes, morbidity and mortality exist between urban and rural regions, an area of research that has received a significant amount of attention both nationally and internationally.

Health effects on IQ of fluoride

Bruce Spittle

Although the 2014 report, Health effects of water fluoridation: a review of the scientific evidence, found that water fluoridation did not adversely affect brain development, it recommended that a similar review should be repeated if a large well-designed study was published that appeared likely to have shifted the balance of health benefit vs health risk.

Caryn Thomas, Rhiannon Braund, Helen Paterson

Management of short supply oral contraceptives

PHARMAC is tasked with, among other things, the challenge of providing continuity of supply of funded medicines for our relatively small country, and stands behind the nature of the sole supply contracts resulting in fewer supply issues compared to most other countries.

Ibrahim S Al-Busaidi, Miriam Martin

Provision of primary care in managed isolation and quarantine facilities during the COVID-19 pandemic: lessons learned from Christchurch, New Zealand | OPEN ACCESS

The COVID-19 pandemic has presented health systems in New Zealand and across the world with new challenges across the different levels of care delivery.

Medical assistance in dying: a response

David Robins

I read with interest the 26 June article by Winnington and McLeod regarding medical assistance in dying, MAID, in relation to the proposed legislation in New Zealand.

Pawel Tacik, Zbigniew K Wszolek

Perry syndrome: a case of atypical parkinsonism with confirmed DCTN1 mutation: a response

With great interest, we have read the article entitled “Perry syndrome: a case of atypical parkinsonism with confirmed DCTN1 mutation“ by McManus et al published in 24 April edition of the New Zealand Medical Journal.

Kam Lun Hon, Karen Ka Yan Leung

Health advice for counselling: would parvovirus infection in puppies affect children and women?

On Lunar New Year’s eve of 2020, an owner of two two-month-old puppies sought advice about her ill puppy with vomiting and mild loose stools.

Vol 132 No 1489: 1 February 2019

Mind That Child; A Medical Memoir

This a book that recounts the experience of the Auckland Starship’s paediatrician Dr Simon Rowley over his professional lifetime.

Vol 132 No 1488: 18 January 2019

Fat Off; the Right Way A clever and sustainable eating guide for weight loss and healthy living

Paul Anderson is a New Zealander who trained in general surgery and works part-time in Australia and part-time in New Zealand.

Vol 132 No 1488: 18 January 2019

The Art of Recovery: six personal journeys

As an editor you receive books for review, which are sent to suitable people following an email agreement to review.

Vol 131 No 1477: 22 June 2018

The Older Traveller: A guide for the health professional

When I found this book was returned from the initial reviewer without a review from the person who had “volunteered” to review it

Vol 131 No 1477: 22 June 2018

Black Flu 1918; The story of New Zealand s worst public health disaster

This is the account of the 1918 influenza pandemic.

Vol 130 No 1463: 6 October 2017

Governor William Hobson: his health problems and final illness

Yee Chen Lau

Captain William Hobson, our first governor, had a tumultuous year before his untimely death in 1842

Vol 130 No 1463: 6 October 2017

Not Our Problem