About Dr Heather McKenzie
Heather is passionate about raising awareness of the complexities involved in community nursing work and the pivotal role played by generalist community nurses in primary health care. Another interest of Heather's is increasing understanding of patient and family experiences of cancer illnesses and ways in which health care professionals can work with then to ensure optimal outcomes and wellbeing. Heather also has a strong interest in politics of health care in Australia.
Heather’s research revolves around community care of cancer patients, the interface between acute care institutions and community nursing services, cancer and other serious illness experiences, politics of health care and nursing. Heather joined the Faculty of Nursing & Midwifery in 2000. She teaches in the social sciences and humanities streams in the graduate entry and postgraduate Master of Nursing programs. She is a registered nurse and a sociologist and completed her doctoral studies in the School of Sociology at the University of New South Wales. Her PhD topic was cancer survivorship. Heather is especially interested in the relationship between nursing work and patient outcomes, particularly in the area of community care of cancer patients. Much of her research work is concerned with identifying and articulating the complexities involved in comprehensive nursing care and making connections between this work and nurse sensitive patient outcomes. Heather is currently involved in three research projects. The first is an exploratory study of the relationship between community nurses and Chinese-Australian cancer patients; the second is a project designed to identify the nature and magnitude of the problem of chemotherapy outpatients’ unplanned presentations to hospital; the third is a project refining a new clinical pathway intervention designed to address identified unmet needs of chemotherapy outpatients.
Completed projects
2008 MN (Hons) Laynie Pullin: Understanding the lives and caring practices of women who live with spinal cord injured men
2009 PhD Yen-Yen Chia : Nurse-patient interactions and encounters in an ethnically diverse health care setting : the experience of a women’s hospital in Singapore
2009 PhD Naomi Malouf : The transition of new graduate nurses : From beginning practice to seamless practitioner
Students currently supervised
2009 MN (Hons) Annie Williams : Research utilisation in high acuity nursing practice settings : a qualitative study in an Australian context
2009 PhD Peta McVey : A palliative approach for people with declining health, living in hostel accommodation : the state of play
2009 PhD Laynie Pullin : Understanding the lives and caring practices of women who live with men with spinal cord injury in Australia
2009 PhD Moira Stephens : Multiple Myeloma: A study of the experiences of patients and carers using grounded theory
Selected publications
McKenzie H, Boughton M, Hayes S, Forsyth S (2007) Struggling to articulate the value of its knowledge base: The crisis in contemporary nursing. In Morley I (Ed) The Value of Knowledge E-Book, Inter-Disciplinary Press, Oxford, United Kingdom.
McKenzie H, Boughton M, Hayes L, Forsyth S, McVey P, Davies M, Underwood E (2007) A sense of security for cancer patients at home: the role of community nurses, Journal of Health and Social Care in the Community, 15(4): 352-359
Forsyth S & McKenzie H (2006) Comparative analysis of contemporary nurses' discontents, Journal of Advanced Nursing 56(2): 209 – 216
Crouch M & H McKenzie (2006) The Logic of Small Samples in Qualitative Research. Social Science Information 45, 4.
McKenzie H (2004) Personal and collective fears of death: a complex intersection for cancer survivors. In A Fagan (Ed) Making Sense of Dying and Death, Rodopi, Amsterdam
McKenzie H & M Crouch (2004) Discordant feelings in the lifeworld of cancer survivors, Health, 8(2):139-57
McKenzie H (2003), The turn to inwardness and cancer survivorship, Health Sociology Review, Vol 11
McKenzie H (2001) Inwardness: An enduring ‘self’ concept, TASA 2001 Conference Proceedings, C Browne, K Edwards, V Watson and R van Krieken (Eds).
Crouch M & H McKenzie (2000), Social Realities of Loss and Suffering Following Mastectomy, Health, 4 (2): 196-215.
McKenzie H & M Crouch (Dec 2000), Enduring cancer? On the vulnerable margin of disease, Sociological Sites/Sight, S Oakley, J Pudsey, J Henderson, D King and R Boyd (Eds), TASA Conference Proceedings 2000.
Crouch M & H McKenzie (June 1999) A social perspective for menarche? Journal of Youth Studies, 2 (2): 213-225.
Crouch M and H McKenzie (1998) Hold on, you’re a grown girl now! Women’s memories of menarche, Refashioning Sociology: Responses to a New World Order, Eds. M Alexander, S Harding, P Harrison, G Kendall, Z Skrbis & J Western, Brisbane, TASA Conference Proceedings 1998.
Refereed Journal Articles
Forsyth S & McKenzie H (2006) Comparative analysis of contemporary nurses' discontents, Journal of Advanced Nursing 56(2): 209 – 216·
Crouch M & H McKenzie (2006) The Logic of Small Samples in Qualitative Research. Social Science Information 45, 4.
McKenzie H (2004) Personal and collective fears of death: a complex intersection for cancer survivors. In A Fagan (Ed) Making Sense of Dying and Death, Rodopi, Amsterdam·
McKenzie H & M Crouch (2004) Discordant feelings in the lifeworld of cancer survivors, Health, 8(2):139-57
McKenzie H (2003), The turn to inwardness and cancer survivorship, Health Sociology Review, Vol 11·
McKenzie H (2001) Inwardness: An enduring ‘self’ concept, TASA 2001 Conference Proceedings, C Browne, K Edwards, V Watson and R van Krieken (Eds).
Crouch M & H McKenzie (2000), Social Realities of Loss and Suffering Following Mastectomy, Health, 4 (2): 196-215.
McKenzie H & M Crouch (Dec 2000), Enduring cancer? On the vulnerable margin of disease, Sociological Sites/Sight, S Oakley, J Pudsey, J Henderson, D King and R Boyd (Eds), TASA Conference Proceedings 2000
Crouch M & H McKenzie (June 1999) A social perspective for menarche? Journal of Youth Studies, 2 (2): 213-225
Crouch M and H McKenzie (1998) Hold on, you’re a grown girl now! Women’s memories of menarche, Refashioning Sociology: Responses to a New World Order, Eds. M Alexander, S Harding, P Harrison, G Kendall, Z Skrbis & J Western, Brisbane, TASA Conference Proceedings 1998.