The charity is Kidz First which is the children's section of Middlemore Hospital in South Auckland.

Did you know?
Every day in Counties Manukau 20 babies are born, 1 is low birth weight and 4 of the babies will be admitted to hospital in their first year of life.

Kidz First Children’s Hospital in Manukau offers both regional and national health services. The majority of its patients come from the diverse community of Counties Manukau. Within this region there are 100,000 children under the age of 15 and 40% of these children live in impoverished conditions. Diseases such as respiratory illnesses and meningococcal meningitis are a significant problem.

Kidz First, which opened in December 2000 on the Middlemore Hospital site, has an 82-bed inpatient facility and its own emergency department. It specialises in burns, plastics and orthopaedic treatment and also has a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, which caters for premature and critically ill newborns.

11,000 children are admitted to Kidz First each year and some 20,000 are treated in one of the busiest emergency departments in the Southern Hemisphere.

The hospital has a strong family-centred environment, with beds for caregivers to stay with their child, well-equipped playrooms and family lounges. An on-site school provides education for long-stay patients. These excellent facilities are coupled with a dedicated team of staff that help to ensure children and their families receive optimum care.

Kidz First also has a large community-based team that treats sick children in their homes. This team incorporates health promotion work like the current meningococcal B vaccination programme. It has also adapted to meet the community’s needs by taking the services to the people, through initiatives such as mobile testing for hearing and dental health.

The South Auckland Health Foundation was involved in the development of Kidz First, raising funds to support the hospital’s family support areas and specialised equipment.

There’s always more to be done and we’re continuing to work with the District Health Board to support various Kidz First projects and to help ensure that our children receive the best health-care.