A world-renowned professor from the United Kingdom says the rise of conditions such as diabetes and arthritis are one of the biggest challenges facing health care in Northland.
Professor Martin McKee was at Northland District Health Board last week as part of a week-long visit to New Zealand.
In a presentation to health professionals at Whangarei Hospital he said chronic diseases were increasingly becoming a burden on health care systems around the world.
"An important issue for a DHB like here is that, because of the deprivation, not only do you have more people with chronic disease, you have more people with more chronic diseases."
Chronic diseases are conditions such as heart diseases, diabetes, arthritis and cancers such as breast and colon cancer. They tend to develop over time and become more common with age.