Tennant Creek nurse John Wright becomes CRANAplus chair

A Tennant Creek nurse has stepped into the role of chair for the nation’s peak remote health body. Read what he brings to the top job.

The nation’s peak remote health body has appointed a Tennant Creek nurse to be its chair.

John Wright has served on the CRANAplus board since 2005 but was promoted to the chair role thanks to his “commitment to remote health”.

CRANAplus chief executive Linda Kensington said Mr Wright – who works as a nurse education and research coordinator in Tennant Creek Hospital – brought a wealth of governance experience to the role.

“John has been on the board for near­ly two decades of growth and trans­for­ma­tion,” Ms Kensing­ton said.

“Dur­ing his tenure, we have diver­si­fied our mem­ber­ship and grown our capac­i­ty to deliv­er edu­ca­tion and men­tal health ser­vices to meet the needs of the remote health workforce.”

CRANAplus chair and Tennant Creek Hospital staffer John Wright performs air­way train­ing with Vio­let Kud­zot­sa.

Mr Wright said he was “honoured” and “privileged” to take on the role.

“Dur­ing the last 20 years, I’ve aimed to devel­op my gov­er­nance and lead­er­ship skills, but what I feel has real­ly pre­pared me for this role is my time nurs­ing in the bush,” he said.

“The chal­lenges I face along­side my peers in the remote health sec­tor have always moti­vat­ed me and now they’ll steer me in my role as board chair.

“CRANAplus has estab­lished itself as a remote health author­i­ty and a val­ued ser­vice provider that pro­motes the deliv­ery of safe, high-qual­i­ty health­care in remote and iso­lat­ed Aus­tralia.

“The organ­i­sa­tion has worked hard to achieve what is has to date, and what an oppor­tu­ni­ty we have now to build on its suc­cess­es and its capa­bil­i­ty to improve remote health.”

Originally published as Tennant Creek nurse John Wright becomes CRANAplus chair