Revolving Door Syndrome

Our education system is in a code red emergency. We are failing our students, parents and educators yet we are unwilling to have constructive debate on the root cause. Hot topics like the structured literacy versus balanced literacy debate results in sensationalist biased headlines that deepen the ideological divide. According to New Zealand's Auditor General, the Ministry of Education does not kn...

Whoever wishes to foresee the future must consult the past; for human events ever resemble those of preceding times. This is a quote from Machiavelli about the importance of understanding our history. Aotearoa New Zealand, like all nations, must grapple with its past if it intends to avoid repeating its mistakes. With the introduction of Act Party's Treaty Principles Bill, the discussion around Te...

If you ask most people, a safe and just community is a key part of social cohesion. People want safety to go about their business, certainty that there are consequences for bad actions and opportunities for both success and redemption. But what does that look like? A large topic of discussion is whether we are tough enough on crime. Are we doing enough to prevent crime and are we doing enough to m...

Nothing is certain but death and taxes. Death is coming for all of us, but why are we so afraid of talking about it? As a doctor, most of my job has been about saving people. Saving people from harm to their body or mind and alleviating suffering. But what if some of our choices are causing more suffering? What if by sterilising and ignoring the process of death we now just see death as failure? M...

One of the biggest challenges facing us in the 21st century is significant demographic change. We have an ageing population with people living much longer and with fewer children being born. This is resulting in a growing use of immigration to provide the economic activity to fund core public services like health, education and justice. Meanwhile growing income inequality is contributing to worse...

This is part two of a two part series with Dr. Mike Murphy. On episode one, we took a deep dive into the relationship between the healthcare system and the pharmaceutical industry. We examined the incentives for a for-profit system that does not necessarily value overall patient health outcomes in the wider social context. Check out episode one if you haven't already.  In the second half...

As doctors, we rely on the pharmaceutical industry to produce medications, from everyday paracetamol to advanced targeted cancer therapies. The industry faces constant pressure to innovate and create profit for shareholders, while governments face pressure to approve and fund these medicines from patients and clinicians. What we are seeing is a rise in medicines spending. People are living longer,...

Modern day living values universal individual freedom and rights. This has helped open the doors to many great things like individual reproductive choices, same sex marriage and a focus on tackling discrimination against immutable characteristics. But what are the trade-offs? I have this growing feeling that we no longer have communities, at least not ones that are robust, intergenerational and wi...

As doctors, we carry an enormous amount of risk; sometimes, we quite literally hold people's lives in our hands. Under these extraordinary circumstances, with increasing expectations and limited health resources, it's no wonder the pressures on our health workforce are sky-high, making hospitals an even less welcoming place for both patients and healthcare workers. It makes you question whether em...

This is Revolving Door Syndrome, and I am Dr Nina Su. Everywhere you look, the statistics tell a story of Maori doing worse. Of Maori struggling, of Maori poverty. While these statistics are true, it fails to tell the whole story. On this episode of Revolving Door Syndrome, I sat down with Boris Sokratov AKA the Bulgarian Maori to talk about how we can shift the narrative. Much of the conversation...

Why in this age of hyper connectivity and social media are we lonelier than ever? Regardless of race, gender, sexuality, or class, mental health for young people is getting worse. Not only do we see it in self-reported surveys, we see it in hospital presentations for eating disorders, self harm, intentional overdose and suicide attempts. The Harvard Study of Adult Development found that the greate...

Falling literacy rates are a concern in New Zealand and developed countries around the world. The future generations of New Zealanders are based on the early foundations we set in childhood. But if we don't get literacy right, how can we expect children to one day become global leaders in health, education and science? Strong literacy skills are for everyone, not just for those who can afford priv...

Food waste affects our growers, sellers and our wallets. It affects our farmers who try to grow food that meets strict beauty standards. It affects our shrinking household budgets where wasted food is as good as money down the drain. It affects our environment where wasted food decomposing in landfill contributes to our greenhouse gas emissions and climate change. All of this while food insecurity...

Widespread, free and quality education has lifted the masses out of poverty. Or at least that's what it used to do. Access to a quality curriculum with teachers who are supported to teach are important factors to get children interested in education. However, what we are seeing is teachers are increasingly unsupported and overworked. They are having to pick up the pieces for children who are in di...

Trust in government and trust in the media are the bedrocks of a working democracy. True democracy requires the freedoms of speech and expression to allow individuals and the media to hold our government to account. However an AUT research report found that trust in mainstream media has plummeted to 33% while three quarters of people actively avoid reading the news. There are accusations that the...

Let's talk about sex. Sex education has been a particularly divisive topic, yet hasn't really had the quality debate about what good sex education should look like. I get it. People probably have very mixed experiences on how sex education was delivered to them by their schools or their parents. Some people feel squeamish about delivering sex education to their own kids and some are concerned abou...

As the saying goes, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. And in the context of our health system, prevention looks like a strong primary care service that’s focused on keeping you healthy and out of the emergency department. The problem is though, Primary Care, as we know it, is broken. Our current funding model has driven GP practices to the brink of insolvency. Many are forced to clo...

Cults have come and gone but for the survivors, the trauma remains. Most every day people think that they'd be immune to a cult and could never fall for something as silly as a cult. The reality is that anyone can end up falling into a cult willingly or unwillingly whether as an adult or child. It is important that we equip ourselves with the skills to identify cult-like behaviours before we fall...

How have we ended up in both a housing and productivity crisis? Why can't we seem to just get on with maintaining and building more housing and infrastructure? Why does it feel like inequality is getting worse, not better? Joining me on this episode of Revolving Door is Sam Stubbs, founder and CEO of simplicity, a not-for-profit kiwisaver and investment provider. Late stage capitalism and an econo...

When we talk about addressing the mental health issues in society, we often hear that if only we had more psychologists, more psychiatrists, more psychotherapists and counsellors, we'd be able to fix the problem. Hamish William's is a host of NewstalkZB's show, The Nutters Club. He has a different perspective on the issue, given that every Sunday night he listens to real stories from real people f...

Imagine a future where healthcare looks more like the tiers of a Netflix subscription. Where if you can afford it, your premium, gold-plated health service gets you your own personal family doctor. Meanwhile, those on the ‘free tier’ still get access to healthcare, but it’s delivered via algorithm and internet. In the eyes of Melissa Clark-Reynolds, this could one day be a reality. An Officer of t...

Healthcare services around the world are reeling from the consequences of a pandemic. We have news media and social media that are full of discontent with the provision of these core services and we hear the word crisis so regularly, sometimes it's easy to forget what normal is So much of our healthcare system is devoted to the treatment of disease, rather than wellbeing and prevention. So much so...

Can we fix our mental health epidemic with a drastic change in what we eat? That's the question posed by Professor Julia Rucklidge. She's a psychologist and the director of the Mental Health and Nutrition Research Group at the University of Canterbury. Her research has focused on the impact of nutrition on brain metabolism, gut microbiome and how our mental health is directly tied to the gut-brain...

The issues of health, education and welfare can often feel intangible and immovable. Despite feeling like we are slipping backwards on these issues, we often look to the government, expecting them to drive change. Yet, in our focus on government as an omnipotent force, we might overlook the organic source of change at the grassroots. Charities, NGOs and Community organisations often serve as the s...

Top of mind for Nzers, according to the media, is youth crime and ram raids. But when I speak to most people, there’s a deeper understanding that crime is just a symptom of broader societal dissonance. The risk factors for a life of crime and incarceration are well studied and well known, yet it feels like we haven't figured out how to prevent it yet. Or at least we haven't accepted that we need t...