Television newsreader Angela D'Audney has a brain tumour. She is expected to have surgery in an Auckland hospital today.
The head of news and current affairs at TVNZ, Paul Cutler, said yesterday that the tumour was detected last week when D'Audney had an MRI scan.
D'Audney had become concerned a few
days earlier when she had difficulty reading scripts on air.
"Angela is a perfectionist and it troubled her that while she could cope with interviews and ad libs, suddenly she was having trouble co-ordinating prepared scripts," Mr Cutler said.
She had subsequently suffered a speech impairment.
"This symptom of her condition is especially sad as I have always regarded her enunciation as probably the finest of all the broadcasters I have worked with," he said.
She was receiving strong support from friends and colleagues.
D'Audney, 56, entered broadcasting in 1962. She was a raw 18-year-old and was on air on her first day.
In 1973, she was the first female television newsreader on the northern regional programme Look North, before moving on to front the current affairs programme Eye Witness News.
She presented the weekend news with Tom Bradley until its abrupt axing in 1988.
In recent years, she has filled in on news bulletins and Good Morning for TVNZ.
