Ruth Large
Chair NZ Telehealth Forum & Emergency Care Physician
Waikato DHB

Ruth is an Emergency Physician and Rural Hospitalist working for the largest rural District Health Board in New Zealand. Working as Clinical Director of Thames Hospital since 2012 Ruth finds addressing the inequities of rural practice challenging. She has had a keen interest in Telehealth since her outback days and has been the Deputy Chair of the New Zealand Telehealth Forum since 2013. She was appointed to the new position of Clinical Director of Virtual Healthcare for the Waikato DHB in 2015 and both roles allow her a glimpse into the future where patients have better access to the care that they deserve.

Ruth lives on a lifestyle block in the North Waikato with her farmer husband and three children, proving that you can have your cake and eat it too.

Karen Blake
Head of Clinical Informatics
healthAlliance

With more than 20 years in the health sector, Karen's experience spans clinical practice in both Australia and New Zealand as well as time spent in management, education and senior policy roles. She brings together the worlds of clinical practice and IT systems and processes through her work as a clinical informatician at healthAlliance.

She's also regularly called on to put out fires. This isn't a euphemism - she's a volunteer fire fighter in her spare time.

Richard Medlicott
General Practitioner

Richard is a GP at Island Bay Medical Centre in Wellington. He has a long interest in Health IT. He is also past Medical Director for the Royal NZ College of General Practitioners. He sits on the board of Tu Ora-Compass PHO as an elected trustee. He is not as much of a committee doctor these days, with past involvement with Snomed International , Medtech, Health Information Standards Group and the Primary Care Information Management Group.

He remains a keen proponent of telehealth and the use of digital technology to enhance, not replace, continuity of care and a primary care lead health system.

Alex Forsyth

Director of Allied Health, Scientific and Technical, Operational lead
Primary and Community services Whanganui DHB

Alex is the Director of Allied Health, Scientific and Technical, as well as Operational lead for Primary and Community services at Whanganui DHB. She is also a doctoral student at Auckland University of Technology. Alex has over 20 years experience in health across NZ and the UK, both as a Speech and Language Therapist and in various leadership roles.  Alex has specific interest in whole of system healthcare and delivery of equity in health outcomes across urban and rural communities.

She has been leading clinically in the implementation of telehealth within Whanganui DHB, rapidly progressed in response to covid-19.

Webinar facilitator:

Becky George

HiNZ Board Chair

I am passionate about advocating for Allied Health Professions across the health and disability system, particularly within digital health and innovations.  As models of care evolve we need to ensure that we the patient remains the focus in all perspectives of implementation.  I am currently a Doctoral candidate, undertaking a DHSc in Allied Health leadership and continue to work regionally and nationally, consulting on a number of digital health projects.  As a registered Occupational Therapist and an Associate Fellow of the Australasian Institute of Digital Health, I am also the elected chair of the Health Informatics New Zealand board of directors and chair of the Allied Health National Informatics Group. I am co author of the Allied Health National Data Set Standard and am on the Advisory Panel for the Clinical Informatics Leadership Network. As a member of HISO, the MoH’s Health Informations Standards group and of the Sector Advisory Panel for the National Health Information Platform, I am committed to ensuring good governance for digital health is in place.  I was honoured to be a finalist in the ITx, IT Awards for Excellence in Digital Health 2018, and last year was awarded the inaugural Clinical Informatics Leadership Award 2019 recognising achievements of a clinician working in Digital health in New Zealand.