Eileen Goodwin

The Southern District Health Board has announced an all-female line-up to run new Otago-Southland combined clinical departments.

Two Dunedin Hospital operating theatre staff were pleasantly surprised yesterday when their pet project was approved on the spot after it was pitched to a Southern District Health Board judging panel.

Dunedin heart specialist Associate Prof Gerry Wilkins won his second supreme teaching award at the Dunedin School of Medicine Teaching Awards at Dunedin Hospital yesterday.

The Southern District Health Board has called in more outside help to resolve issues at Dunedin Hospital, seconding a National Health Board service manager to improve surgical services.

Dunedin mural artists Filipa Crofskey (left) and Daniel Mead stand in Dunedin's Hoyts Lane by a newly created Otago-themed mural designed by Mangawhai artist Daniel Mills.

Wakari Hospital, in Dunedin, is to have a chapel again after the original closed in 1998.

Merging clinical departments at Southern District Health Board "smacks of a takeover of Otago by Southland", a submitter on the proposal told the board.

Patients are waiting three weeks for "urgent" computerised tomography (CT) scans at Dunedin Hospital - a week more than the target of two weeks.

Orokonui Ecosanctuary, in Dunedin, is now home to 44 wild tuatara.

The Dunedin School of Medicine reviewed its student identification processes yesterday, following the "alarming" revelation of a fake medical student in Auckland, University of Otago Faculty of Medicine dean Prof Peter Crampton said.

A year after Occupy Dunedin took over the heart of the city, they were back yesterday to re-occupy the Octagon - for a while anyway.

Southern District Health Board's population growth forecast used to plan Queenstown health services is lower than the projected increase revealed by Statistics New Zealand this week.

Southern District Health Board chief executive Carole Heatly was paid between $120,000 and $129,999 in her first four months in the job.

Artsenta art worker Greta Doo decorates a mudcake as a colourful picnic scene yesterday.