Judy Penetito Hattie, an Auckland nurse with more than 30 years experience including district and continence nursing, will be the new chair of the College of Primary Health Care Nurses NZNO from November.
Hattie describes herself as a nurse immersed in primary health care with links to a variety of primary health providers, including public health nurses, school nurses, and practice nurses. She stresses the importance of networking amongst primary health care professionals to share resources, knowledge and experience.
“The whole point is to enhance our practice and the care for the patients and communities that we work in.”
She is a continence nurse specialist working for Counties Manukau District Health Board as a district nurse two days a week and a continence nurse manager for the remainder of the week.
Her latter role involves education, community presentations, and one-on-one consultations with patients and families in their home or the clinic. She is on the national executive for the New Zealand Continence Association.
Hattie, whose iwi is Ngāti Haua and hapu is Ngāti te Oro, is also the Tamaki Makaurau (Greater Auckland) representative on Te Runanga of the New Zealand Nurses Organisation.
She said the roles of the college were to bring together all primary health care nurses, to provide a single voice to strengthen the workforce’s political influence, and to enhance the development of professional knowledge and practice in primary health care nursing.
Hattie said a recent example of networking came after she took members of the Australian Primary Health Care Nurses Association (APNA) – who had been attending the recent college conference in Wellington – to Papakura Marae and walked them through how a marae-based, hau ora health centre worked together with other iwi agencies for the wellbeing of whānau. Hattie said it had been a special visit for all parties, and as a result, she had been given a complimentary honorary member of APNA for 12 months and invited to be involved in the APN conference in Sydney in 2014.
Along with networking across the Tasman, where a lot of New Zealand nurses worked, she believed it would also be good to build links and share knowledge, experience, and expertise with the wider Pacifica region.
She said the plan to overcome apathy amongst members, including being at the forefront of primary health care initiatives, and to forger closer links with the wider primary health nursing workforce, like nurses working for the Corrections Department.
“So inviting other nurses to join in with the ‘natter and chatter’ and bring their basket of knowledge and skill and share it with others who bring with them their own basket of expertise and knowledge.”
Hattie has worked as a nurse more than 30 years. She initially trained at the Greenlane School of Nursing and has worked in a wide variety of settings including private surgical hospitals like Ascot and Mercy Hospitals and in areas including orthopaedics, surgical, medical, plastics, and neonatal intensive care. She had also worked at Papakura Marae. She is a grandmother of five mokopuna – four of whom live in Perth.
