This year the keynote speaker for the Whanganui DHB’s annual Porritt Lecture Series is Simon Denny, an Associate Professor and Paediatrician working at the Centre for Youth Health in South Auckland and University of Auckland. He completed his adolescent training in the USA where he was a 2000-01 Harkness Fellow in Health Care Policy. He was the Principal Investigator of Youth’07 which was New Zealand’s second National Youth Health and Wellbeing survey. He has published extensively on youth health issues in New Zealand and was the chair of the Adolescent Health Research Group and Society of Youth Health Professionals Aotearoa New Zealand.


Everyone knows that adolescents are prone to risk-taking behaviours, and that the process of transitioning through adolescence to adulthood is fraught with difficulty. In this year’s Porritt Lecture, titled “Adolescent Brain Development and Risk Factors”, Associate Professor Simon Denny, one of New Zealand’s most eminent researchers into adolescent brain development, explains why this is, and what can be done to improve the outcomes for our young people.

Check out the Facebook event for more info.