Clinical meets cultural as medical students educate via social media

A group of Māori and Pasifika medical and health students have become content creators on a mission to pass on what they are learning – as they’re learning – to help their communities combat inequities through increasing health literacy.

Posting under the collective name Haumanu Hauora, the group is made up of 10 “clinically trained and culturally grounded” students in varying stages of medical and health degrees at Otago University. They come from all over Aotearoa and the Pacific and are currently on placement around the country.

Founder Māia Lockyer said the idea came to her while she was offering free blood pressure checks at Dunedin’s Polyfest two years ago and coming face-to-face with an ethical dilemma. There was a stark knowledge gap, even among those who were taking medications for high blood pressure, she said.

“We often talk a lot about informed consent, but one of the questions that I found asking myself after that experience was how can we truly claim that our people are giving informed consent if they’re not understanding what’s happening with their body or what’s happening in their body when diseases come out, or what the medications we’re giving them are actually doing to their bodies?"

“I got a little hōhā (annoyed) about it because once my eyes opened to those knowledge gaps, I just couldn’t unsee them… I couldn’t stop thinking about how huge of an impact it would have in a patient’s life if all we did was just invest a little bit of extra time into their mātauranga (knowledge).”

Lockyer started talking to people about launching a social media page and did some research around health literacy rates before reaching the point where they needed to “mahia te mahi” (do the work).

She and three other medical students kicked off the page in September 2025, producing explainer-type video and graphic content covering health topics and conditions such as high blood pressure, diabetes and how to get the best out of a trip to the doctors. They use plain language and film in casual, informal settings.

Since then, they have grown to around 8000 followers across Instagram and TikTok, and the team has changed and expanded to include students from the dentistry, pharmacology and physiotherapy health sectors.

She said from a public health perspective it’s a cheap intervention that could make a “huge world of difference” in health outcomes.

Fifth year medical student Tamapuretu Po Mitaera said they identified social media as a means to engage with people on a platform they already use.

“We are a team that uses social media as a tool to help elevate health literacy here in Aotearoa, especially among our Māori and Pacific communities who experience inequities and [issues with] access and standard of care.”

A big driver behind what they do is the recognition that the current medical system doesn’t adequately address the concerns and expectations of whānau, said Mitaera.

He adds: “How can we expect a system that was never really designed with us in mind to work for us in our time of need? We can’t really, so change is required. Adopting new styles of communication is required.”

He said he’s seen the gap between what clinicians say and what whānau take onboard in their lives.

“We’re trying to bridge that gap by making health information a bit more culturally grounded, more accessible and ultimately, empowering for our whānau as well.”

From a first-hand experience, growing up he witnessed how his single mother was treated by the health system and those in it.

“I grew up watching her go to doctors and get inadequate standard of care, not getting what she needed, being brushed to the side.

“Prejudice and systemic racism having negative impacts on her wanting to access health as well, and that really irked me enough to want to be that change and want to step into this realm and be the person of change that our brown people can come to.”

Te Hirea Doherty, who is in her final year at medical school, said it was a common lived experience among Māori and Pasifika.

“As young tamariki we watch a lot of our whānau go through the health system and, unfortunately, a lot of those experiences were negative and, I guess, from there, as we grew up and became older going through high school, it became a lot more apparent the massive inequity between our peoples and other ethnic groups when it came to health.”

Since the 19th century, Māori and Pasifika peoples have consistently had poorer health than other ethnic groups, according to Te Whatu Ora Health NZ’s 2023 status report. Over the last couple of decades, health literacy has been identified as a “key enabler” to improving outcomes.

The ministry defines health literacy as a person’s “capacity to obtain, process and understand basic health information and services in order to make informed and appropriate health decisions”. However, some critics say it doesn’t account for the healthcare system’s responsibility to make information accessible and usable.

Reflecting on her clinical experience, Lockyer said she noticed an “underlying judgement” when it comes to patients that may not exhibit healthy behaviours or adhere to medication and treatment.

“My biggest takeaway from witnessing those whakaaro, and then also being able to talk to patients and see the other side of it through my studies and health literacy, is that… all of our people care deeply about their health, it’s just often they haven’t been handed the information that they need in ways that makes sense to them.”

Doherty, who researched the application of tikanga Māori within a hospital setting to foster a culturally responsive and inclusive healthcare system, said they believed the first start in bridging the health inequities gap was to educate people.

“If you think about yourself in a position where people are almost speaking in a completely different language about your wellbeing and your wellness, and how to make those changes, it can be really difficult to kind of interpret what it is that they’re saying.”

By translating the information, they break down misunderstandings and return the power back to whānau, she said.

Mitaera said, at the core of it all, they want to “normalise understanding of our own health”.

“Things like knowing what your medications do, recognising red flags, even just being comfortable asking questions because we often think they’re silly questions, but there are no silly questions and there shouldn’t be barriers to our whānau’s health.”

He wants people to feel confident engaging with healthcare, advocating for themselves and making informed decisions.

“If we can contribute to reduce some of those inequities we see in this country, even in a small way, that’s just a big win for us.

“There’s also the downstream effect too. So when you have one person in the whānau who learns something new and shares it with their whānau that knowledge and awareness spreads pretty quickly. So, it’s not just about individual knowledge but collective empowerment and moving forward together.”

Doherty said the feedback so far has been “incredibly humbling”.

“We have people across the country who are messaging us or even recognising us within placement, and are just saying thank you, that things that have been explained the way that we have explained them have never been used before – and also having other health professional saying ‘man I didn’t think about explaining it like that’.

“So, all in all, it’s truly been a humbling kaupapa to think that us, you know, young students in our twenties, are able to sort of make this impact on our community.”

Lockyer said it only confirms that the kaupapa is doing exactly what it was meant to do.

“I’ve had a lot of people reach out and say they’ve lived with certain health conditions for years and that one of our videos was the first time that they actually understood what was happening in their bodies.”

When asked what the future holds for the group, Lockyer said, in the short-term, their biggest goal is to make sure everybody passes their exams. In terms of future growth of Haumanu Hauora, she envisions an expansion of team and scope.

“We’re really interested in strengthening the delivery of health literacy teaching within health professional education itself… because I think communication is such an essential part of good healthcare, but it’s not really prioritised in our teaching and that’s where we tend to fall short when we actually enter the healthcare system as kaimahi (workers).”

Branching out into community-based education is another goal, but primary focus is sharing practical knowledge to empower their communities to engage with their health and wellbeing.

A lot of whānau are going through some tough times right now, she said, and when life gets hard health can often fall down the priority list.

“We’re really trying to put out there is that investing in our wellbeing now is one of the best ways we can strengthen the future for our whānau and for our hapori (community).”