Fighting on the frontline against rheumatic fever

Fighting on the frontline against rheumatic fever

Kaitaia doctor Dr Lance O’Sullivan will be in Auckland on Friday 13 May to talk about his experience in the fight against rheumatic fever.

He will talk about the design and implementation of the Manawa Ora Korokoro Ora (Moko) programme – a school based health clinic that provides medical care to 2000 children across the Northland and Auckland regions.

This innovative programme focusses on reducing the incidence of rheumatic fever, but is bringing a wide range of health and social benefits.

He will also talk about how he is using mobile technology to improve the effectiveness of the programme and expand it to more schools.

From the top of the North Island, he has developed the Moko programme to stop rheumatic fever in all tamariki.

The Moko team aims to locate children with Streptococcus A and put them on a 10 day antibiotics plan - curing the child and preventing a damaged heart.

Hundreds of children with StrepA have benefitted from the Moko programme and every week they find more children in need of the Moko team's help.

Today the Moko Programme operates from Commerce Street in Kaitaia where it offers Early Childhood Education, Walk-in clinical services, and the Rheumatic Fever Prevention Task Force (the Moko team).

Every week the Moko team travels to each local school swabbing the throats of hundreds of kids. Volunteers in Moko schools treat any child asking for a throat swab. Together these two systems work to wipe-out rheumatic fever from the Far North.

Moko was developed as a way to reach schools that are unable to be part of the current Moko programme network.

Schools that are isolated beyond daily reach, like Te Hapua School at the very top of New Zealand, can connect over the internet and receive treatment for things like sore-throats and skin infections - just a click away from help.

Dr Lance O’Sullivan was awarded the New Zealander of the Year 2014 for his efforts in improving health in remote rural communities, and was named 2015 Communicator of the Year.

ENDS

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