Stories by Ruth Hill

Victoria Congalton gave up a high-flying career to retrain as a nurse at the start of the pandemic.

Thousands of health professionals are owed billions of dollars for incorrectly calculated holiday pay and untaken annual leave, according to Te Whatu Ora's first annual report.

Senior doctors are being forced to pick up junior doctors' shifts on top of their own work, as hospitals grapple with hundreds of vacancies.

The new coalition government has decided to open an independent inquiry into the pandemic response but a legal expert warns it's not a good look.

However, it has also cut more than $100m off its consultant costs since inheriting more than $500m in contracts from the old DHBs.

Nearly half the country's nurses are not working as nurses, with some even taking jobs in supermarkets or on road gangs.

Te Whatu Ora's beefed up Voluntary Bonding Scheme for new graduates will not stop people dropping out before they even qualify, nurses and midwives warn.

Leading family doctors warn some people are not getting the care they need - or even having their lives cut short - because they cannot find a regular GP.

Eight-year-old Lachie Love knows there is "an egg in his head". But he has not been explicitly told that it is a rare and incurable brain tumour.

Wearing glasses for the first time or getting their hearing problems treated had been life changing for students at Edmund Hillary School - both inside and outside the classroom, according to…

Māori health services are waiting nervously for the election, after National and ACT pledged to scrap the independent Māori Health Authority.

Telehealth workers have been on a 24-hour strike over pay rates - their second in a month.

New Zealand's restrictions during the pandemic saved the lives of about 20,000 people, according to new research.

Specialists and family doctors say this is becoming common practice, as hospital services nationwide become increasingly overwhelmed.

Alternatively, elderly patients with dementia are being housed in general psychiatric inpatient units - a risk to their safety, advocates say.

Covid infections are putting people at higher risk of diabetes, strokes, heart disease and other long-term illnesses - but experts warn it may be decades before the full impact is known.

While Covid-19 cases were down this winter, doctors say other viruses have swarmed in - and babies and preschoolers have been the worst hit.

The 12-year medical career of an Indian doctor counts for "almost nothing" as she is struggling to get registered in New Zealand. Audio

Violence and abuse by patients and visitors have forced staff at North Shore and Waitākere hospitals to call security or hit panic buttons thousands of times within a seven-month period.

A psychiatrist treating perinatal depression and anxiety says the adversarial legal system is not well equipped to deal with cases like that of Lauren Dickason.

Thousands of general practice nurses and other health workers in primary care have voted to accept the government's pay offer.

Clinicians say post-mortem scanning could save babies' lives in future - but it is not an option in many regions.

Te Whatu Ora is setting out to woo more overseas-trained specialists to move to New Zealand by targeting international medical conferences, using local clinicians to do the sweet-talking.

Acute shortages of trainee specialists are fuelling burnout among senior hospital doctors, whose own ranks are thinning. Audio

The "accountability-free" funding for general practice is fuelling the decline in GP work hours and the significant decrease in the GP-to-population ratio, according to new report.