Kaylie Hannah, Batami Pundak and Penny Clark all won awards at the 2026 New Zealand Primary Healthcare Awards.
Penny Clark still gets “a buzz” from seeing patients’ health outcomes improve.
Clark started in pharmacy at 15. Four decades later, the “trailblazer by accident” was named Community or Primary Healthcare Pharmacist of the Year.
The recognition was part of last month’s New Zealand Primary Healthcare Awards He Tohu Mauri Ora.
The awards celebrate outstanding work in primary healthcare, including general practice, nursing and pharmacy.
Other Waikato winners included Practice Nurse of the Year Kaylie Hannah and Rural General Practice of the Year recipients Health Te Aroha and Health Ngatea.
Clark works at Huntly West Medical and NorthCare Pukete Road, helping patients manage complex conditions and high-risk medicine regimens so treatment works in everyday life.
That means ensuring patients understand their medicines and leave with a plan they can follow.
Clark said, “Seeing their health outcome improve is a buzz.
“The most important thing for me is the individual patients and whānau that you form relationships with.”
Her career began as a retail assistant at an Ōhakune pharmacy, before she later moved into hospital and community pharmacy roles.
In 2011, she entered general practice.
Clark qualified as a pharmacist prescriber in 2016 and has chaired the Clinical Advisory Pharmacists Association since 2019.
A pharmacist prescriber can prescribe medicines and adjust treatment as part of a patient’s healthcare team, Clark said.
There are now 20 in Waikato, and she would like to see others in her field in every primary healthcare clinic in New Zealand, Clark said.
“I hope it becomes business as usual.”
Despite her pioneering work as the first pharmacist prescriber in Waikato, Clark is reluctant to claim any spotlight.
“I am very much a trailblazer by accident.”
Alongside patient care, she mentors pharmacists, teaches and advocates nationally. Much of that work is voluntary.
Her advocacy has helped secure continued funding for pharmacists in general practice.
Clark credited her late husband Roger, who died last year, with “always” supporting her.
“He would be proud of me,” she said.
Meanwhile, for Hannah, of Primary Health Care Ltd, children who once cried when she arrived started running to greet her, showing off books, toys and healing sores.
At Our Tribe Early Childhood Centre, which supports under-5s, including children in transitional or emergency housing, Hannah worked alongside her “right-hand woman”, medical care assistant Melissa Epiha.
Primary Health Care deputy chief executive Batami Pundak said transport, taking time off work and difficulty getting appointments could prevent whānau from accessing care.
With Pinnacle funding, Hannah and Epiha visited the childcare centre fortnightly, treating skin infections, respiratory issues and minor injuries. Four-hour clinics often stretched into full days.
Over four visits, she assessed 39 children and referred 10 to Hillcrest Medical Centre for further care.
Pundak said one child’s widespread, itchy skin infection resolved after Hannah assessed them, took swabs and prescribed treatment.
Hannah also reviewed responses to a mental health initiative across Primary Health Care’s seven practices, personally contacting those needing support and connecting them with care.
At Health Te Aroha and Health Ngatea, the journey to an award began with a more modest ambition: survival.
Five years ago, the practices had one GP for 3800 patients.
GP Hayley Scott said staff were exhausted and overwhelmed, while patients faced long waits.
“Our goal for that year was ‘to survive’, which thankfully we all did.”
The team needed to stay financially afloat, attract long-term staff and prevent burnout.
“It was clear we had to change, or there wasn’t a future for our practices.”
The practices now have four GPs, three nurse practitioners and three physician associates.
Routine appointment waits had fallen from six weeks to generally one or two, Scott said. Phone triage ensured unwell patients were seen the same day.
Nurse practitioner Emma Hedgecock led women’s health services previously available only through the hospital, saving patients an hour’s travel.
Iwi-partnered “Love Clinics” offered free care to unregistered patients.
Scott said mentoring, training and fun helped create a workplace clinicians wanted to join.
“People have described us as having a ‘special sauce’ which we believe is down to the working culture we have carefully developed.”
Tom Eley is a multimedia journalist at the Waikato Herald. Before he joined the Hamilton-based team, he worked for the Weekend Sun and Sunlive. He previously worked as a journalist at Black Press Media in Canada and won a fellowship with the Vancouver Sun.