Current and completed Public Health PhD students

This page includes a list of the current and former PhD students based at the Department of Public Health. It includes information on their theses and supervisors and is in chronological order based on the students start date from 2010 onwards.

Current PhD students

Clare Aspinall
The transfer and evolution of Housing First in New Zealand
Supervisors: Nevil Pierse, Philippa Howden-Chapman, Sarah Bierre

Isaac Bain
The impact of nitrate contamination on colorectal cancer: A case-control study
Supervisors: Simon Hales, Tim Chambers, Brian Cox

Keresi Rokorua Bako
Enhancing diabetes self-management in Fiji: A mixed method study with patients and health care providers
Supervisors: Louise Signal, Dianne Sika-Paotonu

Tom Bergen
Cost-effectiveness of interventions to improve physical activity participation in rangatahi.
Supervisors: Louise Signal, Alice Kim, Anja Mizdrak

Shashi Chandra
Enhancing diabetes self-management in South Asian (Indian) population in New Zealand: A mixed method study with patients and health care providers
Supervisors: Moira Smith, Louise Signal

Zhiting Chen
Summer indoor overheating in Aotearoa New Zealand public housing and its impacts on tenants’ health and well-being
Supervisors: Kim O’Sullivan, Nevil Pierse

Marcus Gurtner
Kids Online
Supervisors: Moira Smith, Louise Signal, Ryan Gage

Ellie Johnson
Housing as a Social Determinant of Health in New Zealand: Effect of the Healthy Homes Initiative
Supervisors: Nevil Pierse, Elinor Chisholm

Jonathan Kennedy
Integrating infectious diseases and long-term conditions to improve public health and primary care outcomes in Aotearoa New Zealand
Supervisors: Amanda Kvalsvig, Michael Baker, James Stanley

Lydia Le Gros
Housing tenure and inequality in Aotearoa New Zealand: A political economy approach.
Supervisors: Kim O’Sullivan, Nevil Pierse

William Leung
Cost effectiveness childhood influenza vaccination
Supervisors: Michael Baker, Michael Keall

Krishtika Mala
Interventions for Group A Streptococcal Skin Infections
Supervisors: Julie Bennett, Michael Baker

Negin Maroufi
Using the influenza disease pyramid to predict the coming flu season in New Zealand using machine learning techniques
Supervisors: Michael Baker,  Gill Dobbie, Sue Huang, Lucy Telfar Barnard

Sharla McTavish
The Impact of Sepsis in Aotearoa New Zealand
Supervisors: Michael Baker, Amanda Kvalsvig, Alice Kim

Alice Miller
Understanding transport policymaking processes as a pathway to health
Supervisors: Caroline Shaw, Richard Edwards, Emma Osborne

Jennifer Ombler
Housing and Human Rights
Supervisors: Sarah Bierre, Kate Schick, Philippa Howden-Chapman

Courtney Steel
The Health gains, cost and cost effectiveness of dietary and physical activity interventions targeting children and adolescents
Supervisors: Louise Signal, Cristina Cleghorn, Tony Blakely

Sione Tu’itahi
Tufunga Fonua: Tongan Indigenous approaches to promoting planetary health and human wellbeing
Supervisors: Louise Signal, Melenaite Taumoefolau, Viliami Puloka

Completed PhD students  

2024

Frances Graham
A study of Legionellosis epidemiology and alternative environmental risk factors for the disease in New Zealand
Supervisors: Simon Hales, Nevil Pierse, Paul White, Michael Baker

2023

Amanda D'Souza
Are children a priority in public policy? Lessons from case studies of Sweden, Australia, and Aotearoa New Zealand
Supervisors: Louise Signal, Richard Edwards

Eloise Pollard
He toki aronui haratua kia papa. Interrupting white business as usual: Applying the Health Equity Assessment Tool in health service and programme planning in Aotearoa
Supervisors: Louise Signal, Bridget Robson

Ed Randal
Fairer transport outcomes: Improving health, wellbeing and equity through transport policy
Supervisors: Michael Keall, Caroline Shaw, Alistair Woodward

Helen Viggers
Feeling the chill: New Zealanders and our cold homes
Supervisors: Michael Keall, Philippa Howden-Chapman, Kirstin Wickens, Malcolm Cunningham

2022

Amber Logan
Housing and Health for Whānau Māori
Supervisors: Philippa Howden-Chapman, Hera Cook, Keri Lawson-Te Aho

2021

Sherif Ammar
Human arbovirus diseases in New Zealand: Risk factors and outbreak scenarios
Supervisors: Simon Hales, Mary McIntyre, Michael Baker

Brodie Fraser
“We can’t find a safe or secure environment to be ourselves”: Takatāpui/LGBTIQ+ homelessness in Aotearoa New Zealand
Supervisors: Hera Cook, Nevil Pierse, Elinor Chisholm

Caroline Fyfe
From hearth to health: An investigation into the health impacts of the Warm Up New Zealand home insulation subsidy programme
Supervisors: Lucy Telfar-Barnard, Philippa Howden-Chapman, Jeroen Douwes

Paula King
Oranga Mokopuna. Ethical co-designing for the pluriverse
Supervisors: Donna Cormack, Richard Edwards

Christina McKerchar
Food availability for tamariki: a rights-based approach
Supervisors: Louise Signal, Cameron Lacey, Gillian Abel

Kim Nathan
Every move matters: Residential mobility and health and wellbeing outcomes in New Zealand children
Supervisors: Nevil Pierse, Philippa Howden-Chapman

Matthew Shaw
How the Stepping Stones programme prevented intimate partner violence in two West African communities. A critical realist extended case study
Supervisors: Louise Signal, Geoff Fougere

Andrea Teng
What is the impact of sugar-sweetened beverage taxes? A focus on the Pacific
Supervisors: Nick Wilson, Louise Signal, Murat Genç

2020

Lara Rangiwhetu (Rapson)
Social Housing upgrades effect on tenants' health, education, safety and social cohesion
Supervisors: Philippa Howden-Chapman, Nevil Pierse

Graciela Rivera-Munoz
Can evidence-based practice policy in health promotion answer the call of global health security?
Supervisors: Philippa Howden-Chapman, Vivienne Ivory

Stella Vickers
Exploring the relationships between smoking and quitting behaviors and mental health and perceived stress
Supervisors: Hera Cook, Richard Edwards

2019

Mike Bedford
Infectious disease risk for children and their families associated with early childhood education service environmental conditions            
Supervisors: Lucy Telfar-Barnard, Julian Crane, Julie Bennett

John White
Commercial and health influences on food labelling policy in New Zealand and Australia: a case study
Supervisors: George Thomson, Louise Signal

Jude Ball
Describing & explaining trends in key adolescent risk behaviors in high income countries
Supervisors: Richard Edwards, Hera Cook, Dalice Sim

2018

Jane Oliver
Investigating potentially modifiable factors that increase the risk of children developing GAS pharyngitis and acute rheumatic fever
Supervisors: Michael Baker, Nevil Pierse

Losa Moata'ane
Inequalities and health in Pacific communities: Policy implications
Supervisors: Peter Crampton, Philippa Howden-Chapman

Melissa McLeod
Equity In Cost Effectiveness Analysis
Supervisors: Tony Blakely, Ricci Harris

Tim Chambers
Children's everyday exposure to alcohol advertising: An analysis using automated camera technology
Supervisors: Louise Signal, Moira Smith

Amanda Kvalsvig
Pre-hospital parenteral antibiotic treatment for meningococcal disease
Supervisors: Michael Baker, Tony Blakely

2017

Michelle Barr
Classification of food & beverage making: a comparison using available nutrient profiling models
Supervisors: Louise Signal, Moira Smith

Trang Khieu
Estimating the health burden of influenza in New Zealand
Supervisors: Michael Baker, Lucy Telfar-Barnard, Nevil Pierse

Sarah McKenzie
How should we be evaluating the New Zealand Suicide Prevention Strategy?
Supervisors: Sunny Collings, Gabrielle Jenkins

Inga O'Brien
Supported self-management: a novel cancer survivorship care pathway
Supervisors: Diana Sarfati, Louise Signal

Frederieke Van Der Deen
Using simulation modelling to estimate the future smoking prevalence, health, and cost impacts of tobacco endgame strategies
Supervisors: Nick Wilson, Tony Blakely

2016

Eli Chisholm
Movement for change: New Zealand renters and the conditions of their homes
Supervisors: Philippa Howden-Chapman, Geoff Fougere

Ruth Cunningham
Health outcomes for mental health service users - exploring the case of cancer
Supervisors: Sunny Collings, D.Peterson, Diana Sarfati

Rebecca Gray
Smoking as an "informed adult choice" among young New Zealanders
Supervisors: Richard Edwards, Janet Hoek

Caroline Shaw
Quantifying the health effects of climate change mitigation policies in New Zealand
Supervisors: Richard Edwards, Philippa Howden-Chapman, Simon Hales

Virginia Signal
Stomach cancer inequalities and the development of health care process and system interventions
Supervisors: Diana Sarfati, Jason Gurney, Jonathan Koea, Kevin Dew

Moira Smith
Attitudes of children and adults to the food environment in organised sport
Supervisors: Louise Signal, Richard Edwards

2015

Nicholas Preval
Statistical and econometric approaches to evaluating large-scale public health interventions
Supervisors: Michael Keall, A.Grimes

Mary-Ann Thompson
Settlement of Kiribati Families and the Impact of Climate Change
Supervisors: Philippa Howden-Chapman, Geoff Fougere

2014

Kate Amore
Counting for something: Conceptualising and counting homelessness in Aotearoa New Zealand
Supervisors: Philippa Howden-Chapman, Michael Baker

Mary-Ann Carter
Is Junk Food Promoted Through Sport?
Supervisors: Louise Signal, Janet Hoek, Richard Edwards

Carolyn Hooper
Belongingness: How neighbourhood gets under the skin
Supervisors: Vivienne Ivory, Geoff Fougere, Sunny Collings

Aparna Lal
Ecological change, water quality and diarrhoeal illness in New Zealand
Supervisors: Simon Hales, Michael Baker

Ramona Tiatia
Family central heating at home
Supervisors: Philippa Howden-Chapman, S.Dean

Diana Sarfati
Developing new comorbidity indices for cancer populations using administrative data
Supervisors: Peter Crampton, Nevil Pearse

Matthew Soeberg
Ethnic and socioeconomic trends in cancer survival, New Zealand, 1991-2004
Supervisors: Tony Blakely, Diana Sarfati, Geoff Fougere

2013

Keri Lawson-TeAho
Whaia Te Mauriora. In Pursuit of Healing. Theorising connections between soul healing, tribal self-determination and Maori suicide prevention in Aotearoa/New Zealand
Supervisors:

Judy Li
The effectiveness of graphic warnings on cigarette packs in improving knowledge of harms of smoking and encouraging quitting
Supervisors: Richard Edwards, Janet Hoek, James Stanley

Kim O'Sullivan
Power and Control: A multiphase mixed methods investigation of prepayment metering and fuel poverty in New Zealand
Supervisors: Philippa Howden-Chapaman, Geoff Fougere

Frank Pega
The effect of anti-poverty and in-work tax credits for families on self-rated health in parents in New Zealand: A cohort study of 6,900 participants of the Survey of Family, Income and Employment
Supervisors: Kristie Carter, Tony Blakely, Peter Davis

2012

Johanna Reidy
Working Together: Governance at the interface between primary care and public health
Supervisors: Peter Crampton, Pat Neuwelt

Marie Russell
Travel time use on public transport: what passengers do and how it affects their wellbeing
Supervisors: Louise Signal, Jackie Cumming, James Stanley

Jennifer Summers
The Burden and Risk Factors for Death from the 1918-19 Influenza Pandemic amongst the New Zealand Military Forces of World War One
Supervisors: Nick Wilson, Michael Baker

Esther Woodbury
Auto-mobile: Disabled Drivers in New Zealand
Supervisors: Sunny Collings, Philippa Howden-Chapman, William Levack

Juliet Rumball-Smith
Inequality in quality? The selection and use of quality indicators to investigate ethnic disparities in the quality of hospital care, Aotearoa New Zealand
Supervisors: Tony Blakely, Diana Sarfati, Phil Hider and Annabel Ahuriri-Driscoll

2011

Mavis J Duncanson
Unintentional domestic injury from fire and flame in Aotearoa New Zealand
Supervisors: Alistair Woodward, Clare Salmond, John Langley, Kevin Dew, Michael Bates

Nicole Hermanson
New Zealand social service community organisations as advocates for health: Not just "social justice heroes always on the periphery"
Supervisors: Louise Signal, Peter King

Nevil Pierse
Statistical causality in participant unblinded randomised community trial
Supervisors: Michael Keall, Richard Arnold

Sharon Ponniah
Addressing Smoking Among Young People in New Zealand - A Study of Youth Smoking and Smoking Cessation
Supervisors: Nick Wilson, Richard Edwards

2010

Fiona Imlach Gunasekara
Rich and well, poor and sick? The relationship between income and self-rated health from the New Zealand household panel Survey of Family, Income and Employment (SoFIE)
Supervisors: Tony Blakely, Kristie Carter, Ivy Liu

Lucy Nguma
Health seeking and health related behaviour for type 2 diabetes mellitus among adults in an urban community in Tanzania
Supervisors: Richard Edwards, Peter Crampton

Christina Severinsen
Marginally grounded: Camping ground residence in New Zealand
Supervisors: Philippa Howden-Chapman, Kevin Dew

Lucy Telfar Barnard
Home truths and cool admissions: New Zealand housing attributes and excess winter hospitalisation
Supervisors: Michael Baker, Philippa Howden-Chapman

Mathew Walton
Promoting childhood nutrition through primary schools: A complex analysis of policy options
Supervisors: Louise Signal, George Thomson

2004

George Thomson
A Divided State: Bureaucratic and Corporate Influences on Tobacco Control Policy-making in New Zealand 1984-2001 [Abstract].