Professor Emeritus Elaine Rush, MNZM, PhD, has been involved in health and education throughout her working career. In 2014, she was appointed a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to health, and in 2019, she was appointed Professor Emeritus in recognition of her long and distinguished service to the University through outstanding research and teaching.
Her diverse research expertise in the measurement of body composition, energy expenditure, physical activity, nutrition and risk factors for disease, an interest in ethnic differences in health and involvement in programmes and actions that will make a difference to health has across the lifecycle has led to over 200 publications.
She is involved in projects such as Energize in preschools and primary schools, which reaches more than 60,000 children, the health and growth of children whose mothers had gestational diabetes, and the longitudinal Pacific Island Family study, which tracks over 1,000 Pacific children from birth.
She is a Council of the Health Research Council member from 2021. Elaine also serves on the Councils of several nutrition and obesity organisations and is the New Zealand representative for the World Obesity Federation. She has been an expert consultant for the World Health Organisation and the International Atomic Energy Agency in Nutrition and Health. She is a fellow of the Australasian Society of Lifestyle Medicine and Adjunct Professor at Munster University in Cork, Ireland.
