Traditional healers in line for wards

By TOM CLARKE

Traditional Maori and Pacific Island healers may soon be formally sharing the wards of South Auckland hospitals with orthodox medical professionals.

The newly-appointed clinical director of South Auckland Health's integrated-care team, Dr John Wellingham, says indigenous medicine is "not a big part of our care, [but] it's a big part of our awareness.

"What we need to do is recognise that in supplying Western medicine, we're actually just completing the medical care of people who are using all these other remedies.

"We're not fixing the problem, we're actually fixing a component of their problem." Dr Wellingham says indigenous healers work on hospital wards in some places abroad and that the management committee of South Auckland Health is looking at this too.

He is in favour of it. "I think it would be lovely to have people on the wards that the patients actually relate to and respect and who fulfil the patients' needs," he says.

"The downside to it is trying to get value for the country in relation to the community dollars spent on health. We need to justify what gains society gets from it in relation to the cost involved."

Dr Wellingham says for Maori people it may be healers using mirimiri, which is a form of massage and touch, or administering rakau rongoa, a herbal remedy produced from a medicinal plant.

For Pacific Islanders, their traditional forms of aromatherapy, acupuncture and massage could be used.

These complementary supporting treatments allow people to cope with some of the nastier treatments of orthodox medicine, he says.

"Coming in and having an anaesthetic is not a great thing to do," Dr Wellingham says.

"But if there's someone there giving you a bit of aromatherapy or massage, you may well feel that you'll handle it a lot better.

"It's about making people feel comfortable and that's a part of health. From a community perspective, being comfortable with one's self and being able to function in society is being a healthy person."

Dr Wellingham says as clinical director he has no authority to institute such developments, but he is supporting the alignment of the two processes in a "fairly objective way."

He is trying to balance issues of safety and managing the dollars, with the consumer's need to be supported while in the system.

Dr Wellingham trained as a hospital physician and then spent 20 years in general practice on the North Shore.

He has also held executive positions in the Medical Acupuncture Society and on assignments such as the South Auckland diabetes project and Auckland University's general practice quality assurance unit.

As clinical director of the integrated-care team, he is involved in the development and evaluation of projects which integrate services between South Auckland Health, general practitioners and the South Auckland community.

South Auckland Health says the objective is better health for the community through the better coordination of health initiatives and a focus on the holistic health needs of a diverse population.