Twenty years ago, Chris Heath joined Mobile Health expecting to be on the road for six months. “I couldn’t have imagined being here all these years later,” Chris says.

“We were a small organisation finding our feet using ingenuity, flexibility with a huge amount of passion and commitment to rural surgical services. Twenty years later we have grown as an entity with just as much passion from the staff based in the head office in Christchurch. This keeps an aging technician very content in his work and very excited about the future,” he adds.

Reminiscing about the last 20 years, Chris says it’s been a privilege getting to know some of the rural nursing staff who he describes as the ‘backbone of primary care in New Zealand’. “The anaesthetists and surgeons who also take a huge step outside of their ‘normal’ environment, are truly amazing people and have allowed me to develop professionally and personally, and for this, I am very grateful.

“I have shared an immense about of time with the core Mobile Health team and we have all become family. Roll on the next 20 years and bring on the inevitable changes in healthcare. I know we will, as an organisation and as individuals, embrace and innovate to allow the surgical unit to continue being such fun!”

Chris Heath – Anaesthetic Technician, Mobile Health