Richard Stein, MD, FRACP, FACG, AGAF

Lower Hutt

Chair, Crohn’s and Colitis New Zealand Charitable Trust.

Richard is a consulting gastroenterologist and Chairman of Crohn's & Colitis New Zealand Charitable Trust. US-born, he is a graduate of Columbia University and the University of Illinois and did his gastroenterology fellowship at Emory University in Atlanta. Before moving to New Zealand in 2007 he practiced for many years in Seattle and was Assistant Clinical Professor of Medicine at the University of Washington Medical School.

Richard currently practices in Lower Hutt, but also works at Northlands and Hawkes Bay DHBs. He is a Clinical Senior Lecturer at University of Otago School of Medicine, Wellington and an elected member of the Hutt Valley District Health Board.

Richard has a strong interest in IBD and a long history of advocating for his patients. In the States, he was Chairman of the Northwest Chapter of the Crohn's & Colitis Foundation of America, and helped organise one of the first camps in the US for children with IBD. He was the recipient of the Ashley O’Connor and Mike McCready Award for his contributions to patients with IBD. His dream was to start an annual camp for children with IBD  in New Zealand, which became a reality in 2015.

Malcolm Arnold, MB, ChB, FRCP, FRACP

Christchurch

President, New Zealand Society of Gastroenterology

Malcolm is a Gastroenterologist in CDHB having moved from Hawkes Bay to Christchurch in March 2020. He graduated from Glasgow University in 1984, trained in Gastroenterology in Portsmouth, Southampton, Manchester and Liverpool and moved to New Zealand in 1994, initially working in Hawera, Taranaki, then moving to Hastings in 2000. He is currently President of the New Zealand Society of Gastroenterology. He has an interest in IBD and also in quality in endoscopy and is the Clinical Lead for the National Endoscopy Quality Improvement Programme in New Zealand. He is a member of the board of CCNZ. He has attended all but the first of the Camp Purples where he is inspired by young people demonstrating so ably their ability to cope with the adversity of IBD, and is a keen advocate for providing the best possible care for IBD and all other patients in his care.

Professor Richard Gearry MB ChB, PhD, FRACP

Christchurch

Professor of Medicine, University of Otago

Richard is a Gastroenterologist at CDHB and is Head of the Department of Medicine at the University of Otago, Christchurch. He has a clinical and research interest in inflammatory bowel disease and is an executive and only New Zealand member of the International Organisation for the Study of Inflammatory Bowel Diseases, Asia-Pacific IBD guidelines group and the World Gastroenterology Organisation IBD Guidelines Group. Richard collaborates widely and his research interests include IBD epidemiology, clinical outcomes, biomarkers, nutrition and therapeutics. He is IBD section editor for Alimentary Pharmacology and Therapeutics and is proud to have been a Medical Advisor to CCNZ since its inception.

Jacqui Stone NP, MN

Auckland

Clinical Nurse Specialist & Chair, NZIBDNG

Jacqui Stone NP, MN, was appointed to the role of Nurse Practitioner (Gastroenterology & Hepatology: long term conditions) at Middlemore Hospital (CMDHB) in 2016, following a 20+ year career working as a nurse with a strong focus on gastroenterology, hepatitis, and research. Jacqui’s current role sees her running a number of nurse-led and community clinics (inclusive of 2 prisons), treating a variety of gastro and liver conditions. Jacqui is involved in nurse education, including as Chair of NZ IBD Nurses Group. She is a keen advocate, both for her patients and fellow nurses and maintains an active membership in the NZ Nurses Gastroenterology Association, Australasian Hepatology Association and associate member of NZSG. She has a Master of Nursing and Postgraduate Diploma in Health Sciences.

Marian O’Connor RGN, MSc in Health Studies

Taranaki

Clinical Nurse Specialist and Co-Chair of the NZ Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) Nurses Group

Marian works as a Clinical Nurse Specialist (CNS) in Taranaki, providing care to patients with Crohn’s and Colitis, following a move from the UK in January 2018.

Prior to living in New Zealand, Marian trained and worked in London, England for 18 years working at internationally renowned St. Mark’s Hospital (national and international referral centre for patient with gastrointestinal disorders). Marian led the IBD nursing service there for more than 10 years and built the largest IBD CNS team in the UK with eleven CNS staff, in order to accommodate the cohort of 10,000 patients.

Marian is the past chair of NECCO (Nurses European Colitis & Crohn’s Organisation), having been a founding member of NECCO since 2008. Marian also led on publishing the first N-ECCO consensus statements (2014) on the role of nurses in caring for patients with IBD.   Marian co-edited the first Inflammatory Bowel Disease Nursing book.

Marian has completed her Masters (MSc) in health studies and at the University of Bedfordshire in November 2014. Marian has also been awarded GI Nurse of the year 2012, and awarded an ECCO Mark Of Merit in 2014 for her work with N-ECCO.   

Marian is currently co-chair of the NZ IBD Nurse Group and also board director of GENCA (Gastroenterology Nurses College Australasia).

Dr James Fulforth MBChB, BSc (Med Sci) Hons, FRACP

Waikato

Consultant Gastroenterologist, Waikato DHB

James graduated from the University of Edinburgh in 2006 and moved to New Zealand for the first time in 2008. After experiences in Hutt Valley, Wellington, back in Edinburgh and in Melbourne, he returned to New Zealand in 2015 to undertake specialist training in gastroenterology, two years of which were spent in Christchurch under the supervision of Professor Gearry.

James has a clinical and research interest in IBD and in 2018 undertook an advanced fellowship at The Edinburgh IBD Unit. Here he was able to experience first-hand the impact that newer treatments can have for the lives of patients with Crohn’s & Colitis.

Since July 2019 James has been working as a consultant gastroenterologist at Waikato DHB, where he continues to pursue his interests in improving outcomes for patients with IBD.