I have just read through another thread from a family moving to New Zealand with a tube fed child and am so glad to say I have found out more info on this site in the last ten mins than we have done in weeks of searching the web, so Thank You!! We have a two year old boy, Harrison, who is the light of our lives and totally tube fed. We are seriously looking into moving to NZ from the UK but obviously have concerns about his care when we arrive. He has Neocate advance formula via a mini button and pump. He also takes Omeprazole. We needed to know if all his stuff was available out there and how much it would cost us. Everything is supplied to us here without charge!! Can anyone provide me with information or links for perhaps a community nursing team or other relevant medical people who we could talk to and start setting up the appointments etc which I understand are nessecary ?? any advice or info will be gratefully recieved.......

Harrison's Mommy (Helen).

Hi Helen

Sounds like a lot of decisions ahead of you! Do you know what area of NZ you would be moving to?

My son Jayden was tube fed via a mickey button for the majority of the time until he was two and then off and on again several times after that. All our equipment -pump, tubing, syringes etc was supplied free of charge from the hospital. i would just ring them each month and tell them what supplies I needed and the wonderful lady in charge would package everything up for me so it was ready for me to just go in and pick up. We also had access to the community paediatric outreach nurses who were always only a phone call away and who would make home visits when necessary. All his formula etc was also supplied free of charge and would be delivered to our door once a month - for neocate advance you will need to be under a paediatrician and have them fill out a form to get you a spcial authority number for it (I don't know all the in's and outs of neocate as Jayden wasn't on that particular formula..but for us, once our special authority number was granted then all his formula was free)

Depending on what area you would be moving to, I would recommend you having an appointment with a paediatrican booked before you come as there can be a long wait to get into one, it would probably also be helpful to have whoever is caring for your son now to write a referral giving your sons history and saying what the immediate needs would be once you arrived so that everything could be sorted without too much delay once you arrived.

I hope that helps in some way, if you have any other questions please just ask :-)

All the best with your decisions

If you are still to choose an area to live, I would choose Auckland. Auckland is better paediatric carewise but cost of living is higher. Next choice would be Christchurch. We are in Christchurch and I wouldn't move to Auckland for the paediataric care but maybe if I was moving to NZ I would choose that.
http://www.pharmac.govt.nz/Schedule is our medication schedule and http://www.starship.org.nz is the hospital for children in Auckland. We have private paediatricians in most areas as well as public ones. Given your situation you probably need a paediatrician within the public system but sometimes you can have the best of both worlds. We see one privately in Christchurch but my older daughter was seeing both private and public at one point - they had opposing views but that is okay. At least we knew the options.