The appointment of former Whangarei audiologist Robyn McNeur to the Southern District Health Board has been welcomed by the Otago Association for Deaf Children.
Association secretary Barbara O'Neill said Ms McNeur had already made contact and she was pleased "our children" would get "a good competent service" as a result of the appointment.
The association had earlier shown concern about the level of service available to families.
As Ms McNeur would be the sole audiologist serving both Otago and Southland she hoped she would be well supported by the board.
The board has advised it will be appointing an audiometrist, but had been waiting to finalise Ms McNeur's appointment first.
The board has been without a permanent audiologist since the end of last year and has been relying on private audiologists and locums.
Ms McNeur is already familiar with the southern scene as she has been working for the board as a locum since October last year carrying out monthly clinics for babies referred from the newborn hearing screening programme.
Originally from Christchurch, Ms McNeur has been an audiologist for 24 years and spent many of the past 19 years at Whangarei Hospital, mainly in the role of charge audiologist.
She has also worked in private practice and the hearing aid industry.
Ms McNeur said her strongest interests were in diagnostic audiology and working with children with permanent hearing loss and their families.
She is a former president of the New Zealand Audiological Society and has been closely involved with the development of the national newborn hearing screening programme.
In her new role, Ms McNeur will be responsible for diagnosing problems and investigating the functional hearing ability of newborns, children, adolescents and adults across the Southern region.
Based in Dunedin, she will spend two days a fortnight in Invercargill.
Southern DHB service manager (specialist surgery) Sally van Rooyen said the DHB was very lucky to have attracted an audiologist of such high calibre.
