For the first time, a part five optometry student, Sushmita Chinchankar, participated in the University’s Rural Health Interprofessional Programme (RHIP) hosted in Whakatāne earlier this year.
Based in Whakatāne, the RHIP was designed to help address and fill health shortages in the regions by placing students in rural practices and hospitals. Previously focused on doctors, including trainee ophthalmologists, the programme is now open to optometry students, offering them an opportunity to gain and apply valuable insight and awareness surrounding cultural factors and healthcare.
Professor Steven Dakin, head of SOVS, said while the optometry degree has always had a large inter-disciplinary element, being part of the faculty of medical and health sciences has extended this further through participation in interprofessional education programmes.
“When I visited Whakatane for the RHIP Completion Ceremony I was struck by the students’ increased awareness of the barriers New Zealand’s rural population face in accessing health services. There is no substitute for direct experience of the inequity in healthcare this leads to and it was obvious that it had a profound impact on many of the students. In training a generation of optometrists who can better help manage the eye health of all New Zealanders, this is exactly the perspective we seek to promote in our graduates.”
Sushmita Chinchankar completed the five-week rural health programme in February 2019 and said she found the experience life-changing. “It gave me a better insight into the love, passion and care that everyone displayed towards their rural community.”
