Rangahau
What the research shows
57 papers published by members of Hei Āhuru Mōwai, read and grouped into themes. This page sets out what each summary was built from, and what the collection does not reach.
How to read this page
Who wrote the summaries
Every summary here was written for this website by Redux, the team building it, from the paper itself. They are not the authors’ abstracts and they are not the authors’ words. Each paper is linked, so any summary can be checked against it.
Hei Āhuru Mōwai has not yet reviewed this page or the summaries on it.
What was actually read
37 of these summaries were written from the whole paper. 3 were written from part of one, where only some sections could be reached. 17 – 30% of the collection – were written from the abstract alone.
Where the assessment records a reason it differs from paper to paper: a paywall or a sign-in wall, a publisher page that refused an automated request, a file that could not be fetched. Some record no reason at all. Each paper below carries a badge saying how much of it was read, and the route taken to it is printed with the summary in the assessment’s own words.
A summary built from an abstract, or from part of a paper, deserves less weight than one built from the whole of it. Nothing on this page pretends otherwise.
Not all of it has results
4 of these are registered protocols: the design of a study, published before it has findings. A further 13 are viewpoints, commentaries, editorials, position letters or narrative reviews, which argue a case or draw together other people’s work rather than report a new dataset. Both kinds are worth reading and neither is evidence of an outcome.
The method line on each entry says which kind of document it is.
How the collection was gathered
These are papers Hei Āhuru Mōwai holds, gathered because its members wrote them. No systematic search was run, and no inclusion criteria were applied beyond that.
A subject missing from this page says nothing about the literature. It says this collection does not hold a paper on it.
6 of these papers are not cancer studies
This is the organisation’s own list of what its members have published, so what is on it is settled by who wrote a paper rather than by what the paper is about. These 6 are named here rather than dropped, each with the assessment’s own words on where it sits.
4 are about the system cancer care runs through
Each is about the system cancer care runs through rather than about a cancer. The assessment records each as not cancer-specific rather than as unrelated, and says what it bears on. 3 of them also sit under a theme below.
- What we do matters: Supporting anti-racism and decolonisation of public health teaching and practice through the development of Māori public health competenciesFrom the assessment: It is a workforce-training resource rather than a cancer-outcomes study, of most use to Hei Āhuru Mōwai if it is assessing or building training for people working with Māori across the cancer system, not only clinicians.
- Mortality outcomes and inequities experienced by rural Māori in Aotearoa New ZealandFrom the assessment: This paper is not cancer-specific - it covers all-cause and amenable mortality generally (amenable mortality means deaths that good healthcare could plausibly have prevented, a category that includes but is not limited to some cancers).
- Disparities in post-operative mortality between Māori and non-Indigenous ethnic groups in New ZealandFrom the assessment: This covers surgery generally, not cancer surgery specifically.
- Postoperative mortality in New Zealand following general anaesthetic: demographic patterns and temporal trendsFrom the assessment: This is not a cancer-specific paper, but cancer surgery happens under general anaesthetic, so a gap of this size in the wider surgical system is relevant background for anyone looking at Māori cancer treatment outcomes.
2 the assessment says are not about cancer
Each of these is here because a member of the organisation wrote it. What the assessment says about each, it says in the words below, on that paper’s own terms.
- Tū Kaha: He mōhio ki ngā Māori o te kōmaoa waewae (Stand Strong: A qualitative study of Māori with venous leg ulcers in Aotearoa New Zealand)From the assessment: This paper is not about cancer – it concerns venous leg ulcers, a vascular skin condition.
- Te Pepe Ao Uri Whāriki. The development of pūrākau analysis frameworkFrom the assessment: This paper is not about cancer.
The shape of the collection
| Subject | Papers |
|---|---|
| National figures on incidence, stage and survival | 7 |
| Lung cancer | 8 |
| Screening participation and design | 9 |
| Access to surgery and treatment | 10 |
| Time to diagnosis, and the route people take to it | 5 |
| Palliative and end-of-life care | 3 |
| Cancer policy and system design | 9 |
| Data, research governance and workforce | 8 |
| Prevention and co-occurring conditions | 5 |
| Services through COVID-19 | 3 |
| Subject | Papers |
|---|---|
| System and policy | 27 |
| Treatment | 21 |
| Screening | 16 |
| Diagnosis | 13 |
| Data | 12 |
| Prevention | 6 |
| Workforce | 4 |
| Palliative care | 3 |
| Living after treatment | 1 |
The dated papers run from 2016 to 2024. 9 carry no publication year in the assessment, so no date is shown for them rather than a guessed one.
The themes
10 groupings, made for this website so the collection can be read. They are a finding aid, and are not Hei Āhuru Mōwai’s statement of its research priorities.
8 papers in this theme
Show every themePūkahukahu – Lung Cancer
Quoted from Hei Āhuru Mōwai's own WICC 2026 programme, Plenary 2: "Pūkahukahu – Lung Cancer".
The largest theme in the collection. It runs from who is diagnosed and how they reach that diagnosis, through screening trials still underway, to the travel and the surgery that follow.
8 papers, 3 of them summarised from less than the whole paper.
Access to and Timeliness of Lung Cancer Surgery, Radiation Therapy, and Systemic Therapy in New Zealand: A Universal Health Care Context (opens in a new tab)
Summarised from the abstract· 2024
national registry cohort, 27,869 lung cancer registrations, 2007–2019
Our summary of what it found
Using the same national dataset of 27,869 New Zealand lung cancer registrations from 2007 to 2019, this study compared access to and timing of treatment between Māori and European patients. Māori patients were less likely to receive surgery than European patients (14% versus 20%), including curative surgery (10% versus 16%), and this gap was not explained by stage, tumour type or comorbidity. Once age was accounted for, there were no significant differences between Māori and European patients in access to radiation therapy or systemic therapy, nor in how quickly treatment started. The authors conclude that Māori patients who may be good candidates for surgery are missing out on it more often than European patients, for reasons the available data could not explain.
Why it matters: An unexplained gap in surgery access, in a universal health system, is a harder equity finding to argue away than a gap explained by geography or stage at diagnosis. It points at decision-making in the surgical pathway itself as a place to look.
Limits: Read at abstract level via a secondary aggregator, not the publisher page or the full PMC text directly, both of which were blocked. Shares its dataset with the Supportive Care in Cancer travel-equity paper above.
Read as: abstract, read via a Semantic Scholar record for the paper — the ASCO publisher page redirected to a sign-in wall (PMID 38301179, PMC10846779, also captcha-blocked directly)
Written for this website from the paper, not the authors’ abstract.
Equity of travel to access surgery and radiation therapy for lung cancer in New Zealand (opens in a new tab)
Summarised from the whole paperSupportive Care in Cancer· 2024· doi:10.1007/s00520-024-08375-9
Gurney J, Davies A, Stanley J, Whitehead J, Costello S, Dawkins P, Henare K, Jackson CGCA, Lawrenson R, Scott N, Koea J
national retrospective cohort, 27,869 people diagnosed with lung cancer 2007-2019 (5,601 Māori, 19,698 European), GIS road-network analysis of home-to-treatment travel
Our summary of what it found
Māori travelled further than Europeans to reach both treatments. For surgery, median distance was 57 km for Māori against 34 km for Europeans (median time 59 versus 40 minutes); Māori were more likely to live over 200 km from the surgical centre (24% versus 16%, adjusted odds ratio 1.83). For radiation therapy the gap was wider: median distance 75 km for Māori against 35 km for Europeans (69 versus 41 minutes), with 20% of Māori versus 15% of Europeans living over 200 km away (adjusted odds ratio 1.41). Māori patients were also more likely to have received surgery at a high-volume centre.
Why it matters: This travel burden falls on people who are also more likely to be diagnosed at a later stage, and it sits on top of the treatment itself rather than instead of it.
Limits: The cohort is limited to people who actually received treatment, so it cannot show whether travel distance kept anyone from being treated at all. Private hospital data was excluded, and radiation therapy type (curative versus palliative) could not be distinguished. I read the full text via PMC.
Read as: full text (PMC10879218, open access)
Written for this website from the paper, not the authors’ abstract.
Ethnic differences in the characteristics of patients with newly diagnosed lung cancer in the Te Manawa Taki region of New Zealand (opens in a new tab)
Summarised from the abstractInternal Medicine Journal· 2024· doi:10.1111/imj.16202
Nguyen H, Lao C, Keenan R, Laking G, Elwood M, McKeage M, Wong J, Aitken D, Chepulis L, Lawrenson R
retrospective regional cohort, 4,933 patients (1,575 Māori, 3,358 non-Māori) newly diagnosed with lung cancer
Our summary of what it found
Māori patients in this region had a markedly higher age-standardised incidence of lung cancer than non-Māori, were more likely to be diagnosed at an advanced stage, and were close to twice as likely to have small cell lung cancer, a subtype with a poorer outlook. Māori patients also had more coexisting health conditions and higher socioeconomic deprivation than non-Māori patients in the same cohort.
Why it matters: It quantifies, for one region, the scale of the stage-at-diagnosis gap behind Māori lung cancer mortality, which is the kind of figure that supports a case for targeted early-diagnosis or screening effort.
Limits: I read the PubMed abstract only, via NCBI eutils; the Wiley publisher page sits behind a cookie wall and I found no PMC or open-access copy. The task listed this as a 2023 paper; PubMed's indexed citation gives Intern Med J 2024 Mar;54(3):421-429, so it was likely available online in 2023 ahead of the 2024 print issue.
Read as: abstract, read via PubMed/NCBI eutils; publisher full text behind a cookie wall, not read
Written for this website from the paper, not the authors’ abstract.
Invitation methods for Indigenous New Zealand Māori in lung cancer screening: Protocol for a pragmatic cluster randomized controlled trial (opens in a new tab)
Summarised from the whole paper· 2023
protocol for a pragmatic cluster randomised controlled trial, up to 48 clinics paired and randomised 1:1, with a nested COPD-assessment cohort
Our summary of what it found
This is a trial protocol, not a results paper. It sets out a plan to compare two ways of inviting people to lung cancer screening, invitations sent from the person's own primary care clinic against invitations sent from a centralised hub, in Māori aged 55 to 74 who currently or formerly smoke and meet a calculated risk threshold. The protocol anticipates around 4,412 invitation letters, with roughly 500 to 550 people going on to a CT scan. The primary measures are the proportion completing a risk assessment and the proportion completing a CT scan in each arm.
Why it matters: Māori carry a substantially higher lung cancer burden, and this protocol treats the way people are invited, not just whether screening exists, as something worth testing properly before a national programme is built around one approach.
Limits: As a protocol, there are no screening-uptake results yet. The paper does not spell out its own limitations in the sections read; it does state the trial is designed and governed with Māori leadership throughout, including a Māori steering committee, dedicated engagement roles, and data sovereignty protections aligned with Te Mana Raraunga principles, and follows the CONSIDER reporting standard for Indigenous health research.
Read as: full text (via WebFetch of the PLOS ONE article page)
Written for this website from the paper, not the authors’ abstract.
Hā Ora: secondary care barriers and enablers to early diagnosis of lung cancer for Māori communities (opens in a new tab)
Summarised from the whole paperBMC Cancer, Volume 21, Article 121· 2021· doi:10.1186/s12885-021-07862-0
Jacquie Kidd, Shemana Cassim, Anna Rolleston, Lynne Chepulis, Brendan Hokowhitu, Rawiri Keenan, Janice Wong, Melissa Firth, Karen Middleton, Denise Aitken, Ross Lawrenson
qualitative kaupapa Māori study: 9 community hui (108 participants - patients, whānau, community members) and 9 provider hui (27 primary-care staff), thematic analysis with independent double-coding
Our summary of what it found
Two broad themes emerged: barriers within specialist services/treatment, and the whānau journey. Reported barriers included long waits and delayed referral for diagnostic imaging, poor communication between hospital departments and district health boards, insensitive specialist interactions, thin health-literacy support, and services that did not accommodate tikanga or whānau involvement. Reported enablers included whānau advocacy and proactive engagement, and health literacy passed between generations within families.
Why it matters: Names specific, fixable points in the secondary-care pathway - referral delays, inter-agency communication, cultural fit of specialist services - where rural Māori lung cancer patients are currently losing time to diagnosis.
Limits: Confined to five rural Midland localities, so the specific barriers found may not generalise to urban Māori communities or other regions; I have not independently checked whether the paper's own limitations section states this or other caveats, since I read a structured summary of the full text rather than transcribing the discussion section myself.
Read as: full text (read via PMC's open-access copy)
Written for this website from the paper, not the authors’ abstract.
Impact of low-dose CT screening for lung cancer on ethnic health inequities in New Zealand: a cost-effectiveness analysis (opens in a new tab)
Summarised from the whole paperBMJ Open· 2020· doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2020-037145
McLeod M, Sandiford P, Kvizhinadze G, Bartholomew K, Crengle S
modelling study — Markov macrosimulation using linked New Zealand administrative and health data
Our summary of what it found
Modelled the cost-effectiveness of a national biennial low-dose CT screening programme for lung cancer in current and former heavy smokers aged 55-74. The programme was cost-effective overall at roughly NZ$34,400 per health-adjusted life-year (HALY) gained, and more cost-effective for Māori specifically (about NZ$27,400 per HALY) than for non-Māori (about NZ$36,300 per HALY). Per-person health gains were about twice as large for Māori women as for non-Māori women, and about 25% larger for Māori men than non-Māori men. The authors conclude the programme would narrow the absolute gap in health outcomes between Māori and non-Māori, though relative differences in survival by cancer stage at diagnosis would persist.
Why it matters: Gives a costed case that a national lung screening programme would narrow, not widen, the harm lung cancer does to Māori, which is directly useful for advocacy on programme design and funding.
Limits: A modelling study with wide uncertainty intervals reported alongside each ICER; results depend on assumptions about screening uptake, eligibility criteria and stage-shift, and are estimates rather than observed programme outcomes.
Read as: full text (open-access PMC copy, PMC7517554)
Written for this website from the paper, not the authors’ abstract.
Characteristics and outcomes of lung cancer patients presenting through the emergency department: a Waikato District Health Board study (opens in a new tab)
Summarised from the abstract
retrospective cohort, 2,397 lung cancer patients
Our summary of what it found
Just under 40% of patients attended the emergency department before their lung cancer diagnosis. Māori were 1.27 times more likely than non-Māori to be diagnosed this way rather than through a GP referral. Patients diagnosed via the emergency department had more advanced disease and lower 12-month survival than those who were not, and survival was worse again for patients with two or more ED visits.
Why it matters: An emergency department diagnosis is a marker of a system that did not catch the cancer earlier, and this paper shows Māori patients are more likely to be caught by it.
Limits: The authors note they could not classify why patients attended ED rather than a GP, and flag that more advanced disease at ED presentation may partly reflect reasons other than diagnostic delay.
Read as: abstract, read from the article's own page on the NZMJ website (the PDF link given was too large to fetch directly, so the journal's article page was used instead)
Written for this website from the paper, not the authors’ abstract.
Indigenous access to clinical services along the lung cancer treatment pathway: a review of current evidence (opens in a new tab)
Summarised from the whole paper
narrative literature review, 36 manuscripts and reports included from 1,459 screened, to July 2022
Our summary of what it found
Across the four countries reviewed, Indigenous peoples face disparities in access to lung cancer services at multiple points in the pathway. The clearest and most consistent disparities were in early detection and access to surgery. Evidence on other parts of the pathway, such as chemotherapy or radiotherapy access, was mixed or too thin to draw firm conclusions.
Why it matters: Because this pulls together evidence across four countries, including Aotearoa, it gives a wider frame for interpreting the New Zealand-specific lung cancer findings elsewhere in this set.
Limits: The authors themselves describe the underlying evidence as relatively scant globally, and call for better data collection and monitoring of Indigenous cancer outcomes.
Read as: full text, read via the PMC mirror (PMC11564377)
Written for this website from the paper, not the authors’ abstract.
What this collection does not cover
Each of these is a statement about the papers on this page, and about nothing else. Research may well exist on all of them. It is not held here.
No evaluation of a cancer navigator or Māori cancer support service
Nothing in this collection tests whether a navigator service or a Māori cancer support service works, for whom, or at what cost.
Several papers here argue that support of that kind is needed. The scoping review of palliative care for Māori reports that whānau-led care works better where it is free of the assumptions built into mainstream services. The Hā Ora work on lung cancer names thin health-literacy support and services that do not accommodate whānau involvement among the barriers people described. The integrative review of health service responses to Indigenous people with cancer found better access where services built culturally appropriate care around the population they served, and flags how few such studies have been published at all.
What none of them does is evaluate a service. That is the largest hole in this collection, and it sits directly under the navigator network this site already points people to.
Cancers with no paper here
This collection does not cover:
- Melanoma and skin cancer
- Head and neck cancer
- Bladder and testicular cancer
A further 3 cancers appear in a single paper each.
Life after treatment
One paper in this collection is tagged as being about living after treatment. This collection does not cover late effects, or returning to work after treatment.
Whose voice is in it
The qualitative work here reports what researchers found across groups of participants. This page summarises those papers at the level of their own findings, and carries no individual account.
Elsewhere on this site
Published rangahau is the full bibliography of members’ work, filterable by subject, year and researcher. It lists more than the papers assessed here.
Rauemi holds the organisation’s own reports and papers, alongside resources published by other organisations and linked to them.
If you are looking for a particular piece of rangahau, email communications@heiahurumowai.org.nz.