Rate My Professor Miriama Ketu-Mckenzie

Dr Miriama Ketu-McKenzie is a registered clinical psychologist of Ngāti Tūwharetoa (Turangi), Ngāti Raukawa ki te Tonga (Horowhenua), and Ngāti Kuia (Nelson/Marlborough) descent. She serves as a Senior Professional Practice Fellow in the Clinical Psychology Programme within the Department of Psychology at the University of Otago, where she also acts as a clinical supervisor at the Clinical Psychology Centre. Her academic qualifications include a GradDipArts, MA, MClinPsych, and PhD from Massey University, completed in 2019. Her doctoral thesis, titled 'Ngā mea kōaro o ngā wā tamarikitanga, te taumahatanga o te taiohi pakeke: Adverse childhood experiences, biological embedding and later life health outcomes for Māori women,' investigated the connections between early life stress, cortisol dysregulation, and chronic health conditions among Māori women, emphasizing the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis.

Prior to her academic appointment, Ketu-McKenzie worked as a clinician at the Department of Corrections, Wakari Hospital, Dunedin Public Hospital, and Oranga Tamariki. Since late 2023, she has held the position of Pou Haumanu Māori Clinical Advisor at WellSouth, alongside managing a private practice primarily serving Māori clients. Her research interests focus on early developmental trauma, stress regulation, and culturally responsive interventions to enhance health outcomes for Māori whānau. Key contributions include co-authorship on the OPTIMISE study protocol, a multicentre optimisation trial on continuous glucose monitoring versus self-management in youth with type 1 diabetes (Journal of Diabetes & Metabolic Disorders, 2022), a multicomponent intervention protocol for increasing glucose time-in-range (Contemporary Clinical Trials, 2025), and a book chapter on a culturally enhanced Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction programme for Māori women (2025). She has received the Rose Hellaby Postgraduate Scholarship (2012, $30,000), New Zealand Psychological Society President's Scholarship (2017), and Health Research Council Māori Health Research Knowledge Translation Grant (2024, $5,000) for disseminating mindfulness intervention findings. Ketu-McKenzie has presented on mindfulness and Māori women at the New Zealand Psychological Society Jubilee Conference (2018).