After decades of service in the field of women’s health care, Peetikuia Bessie Wainue Rauna has become the first Maori woman to earn a doctoral degree specialising in the subject of breast cancer among Maori women.
Family and friends of Dr Rauna gathered this week in Te Wharewananga O Awanuiarangi, Whakatane to celebrate her academic milestone as well as her health career which spans over 40 years.
Coming from humble beginnings, Dr Rauna was prepared from a young age to work hard and strive for excellence beginning as a nursing graduate from Hawkes Bay Polytechnic.
Her first health care position was at Cook Hospital as an enrolled nurse. She later became a Wellington Polytechnic Maori health nursing tutor, Victoria University of Wellington Maori health promoter, and the health manager for Te Runanganui Taurahere O Te Whanaganue-a-Tara.
Dr Rauna’s keen interest in health care, coupled with a desire to help Maori women, eventually lead her to seek and achieve her doctoral degree with a focus on the incidence and treatment of breast cancer among Maori women.
Dr Rauna and her husband, Tiopira Rauna, are members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
"The Church has helped in my life to feel the Sprit, even though I do not understand all things," Dr Rauna says. "This Sprit has helped me overcome many, many, challenges and achieve many goals in my life."
She adds that she and her husband "are not perfect, but we know Jesus Christ, through His atonement, enables us to be forgiven of our shortcomings, conditional upon us both forgiving each other and our neighbours."