{"id":582752,"date":"2026-08-28T07:28:13","date_gmt":"2026-08-28T07:28:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/582752\/"},"modified":"2026-08-28T07:28:13","modified_gmt":"2026-08-28T07:28:13","slug":"new-lower-hutt-gp-riverside-medical-hopes-to-cater-to-12000-patients","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/582752\/","title":{"rendered":"New Lower Hutt GP Riverside Medical hopes to cater to 12,000 patients"},"content":{"rendered":"

New Lower Hutt GP clinic meets community need<\/p>\n

Family-owned Riverside Medical has opened its new clinic in Lower Hutt – an area crying out for more GPs<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Data from the Hutt area’s Primary Health Organisation shows about 14,000 people are not enrolled, with 10,000 of those in Lower Hutt alone.<\/p>\n

Husband and wife co-owners, Dr Javier and Chantelle Stroud, were all smiles in their shiny new clinic on Thursday, the smell of fresh paint still in the air.<\/p>\n

According to Chantelle: “People can’t get into a GP for quite some time, so this new facility we’ve built will hopefully help with that.”<\/p>\n

Javier said almost 2000 patients had pre-enrolled, and the clinic would eventually have capacity for 12,000.<\/p>\n

“We’re doing really well, there’s been a strong response from the community, and [enrollments are] still rolling in.”<\/p>\n

He said the biggest barrier to meeting capacity was finding more GPs. The clinic opened with two, and a nurse practioner, while two more GPs were in the final interview stages.<\/p>\n

Javier said he hoped to make the clinic efficient by using AI for admin work, including Medtech AI Clinical Documentation and AI scribe tool Heidi.<\/p>\n

“We want to have our clincians face-to-face with our patients, taking history, being able to communicate treatment plans. And then we want an accurate system that can record all that data.”<\/p>\n

\"Dr<\/p>\n

Co-owners Dr Javier and Chantelle Stroud.<\/p>\n

RNZ \/ Samuel Rillstone<\/p>\n

A lack of GPs had created overflows at Lower Hutt’s after-hours care and other free health services – something the clinic hoped to reduce pressure on.<\/p>\n

After-hours moved into a new, expanded building last year<\/a>, as part of the government’s $164 million investment spent over four years to improve urgent and after-hours care.<\/p>\n

Vibe – a free primary care service for 10 to 24-year-olds just around the corner from the new clinic – had been facing overwhelming calls for help.<\/p>\n

Clinical manager Maraea Savaiinaea said the service was being inundated with calls everyday from rangatahi, who spent weeks waiting for a GP appointment.<\/p>\n

“We are getting phone calls daily of wh\u0101nau who can’t get into their GP … or there’s no one to enrol with,” Savaiinaea said. “We can’t meet the need that’s coming in.”<\/p>\n

\"Vibe<\/p>\n

Clinical manager Maraea Savaiinaea.<\/p>\n

RNZ \/ Samuel Rillstone<\/p>\n

She said she was relieved to have a clinic open just down the road where they could send rangatahi.<\/p>\n

Health Minister Simeon Brown cut the opening ribbon at the clinic on Thursday, standing with Hutt South MP Chris Bishop.<\/p>\n

Both ministers acknowledged a need for more primary care providers in the Hutt.<\/p>\n

This year, the government had invested $120m in primary care, while $180m was invested in 2025.<\/p>\n

Brown said, “We are seeing more practices open their books to patients across the country, which is really important so patients can get that access that they need.<\/p>\n

“It’s all about making sure the system delivers care closer to home and reduces pressure on the hospital.”<\/p>\n

\"Riverside<\/p>\n

A consulting room.<\/p>\n

RNZ \/ Samuel Rillstone<\/p>\n

He said the new after-hours building had seen a 65 percent increase in the number of people accessing urgent and after-hours care.<\/p>\n

The 2025 budget annoucement said $164m would be invested over four years to expand urgent and after-hours healthcare services across the country.<\/p>\n

The local Primary Health Organisation – T\u016b Ora Compass Health – shared news at the clinic opening that another would likely open before the end of the year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New Lower Hutt GP clinic meets community need Family-owned Riverside Medical has opened its new clinic in Lower…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":582753,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[134,527,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-582752","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-health","tag-healthcare","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/582752","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=582752"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/582752\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/582753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=582752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=582752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=582752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}