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Might as well face it, he's addicted to CADS
Monday, 22 March 2004.
Waitemata DHB Communications Dept
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| WHEN YOU'RE READY: New regional manager Robert Steenhuisen proudly displays one of the T-shirts with the new CADS branding that he was involved in developing. |
Robert Steenhuisen's early career as a Dutch social worker is a far cry from his managerial role in Auckland's regional alcohol and drug services.
The self-confessed globetrotter from Holland has recently been appointed as regional manager of CADS (Community Alcohol and Drugs), formerly known as RADS (Regional A&D), replacing Jenny Wolf who has taken up a role in mental health in Tauranga.
Robert cut his teeth for his current role on his position as the former CADS units manager, of which there are five around Auckland - north, south, east, west and central; and is the drive behind the recent Community Alcohol and Drug Services (CADS) "When You're Ready" campaign.
"The vision for CADS is to create a service that’s widely recognised. When people experience alcohol and drug problems they still find it very difficult to know where to go.
Our philosophy is that the service has to be very easy to contact."
With this in mind while he was CADS manager Robert established one phone number for the service and clients are put into contact with the local team from there.
"We established walk in clinics so there are no appointments so people can be seen straight away, which is the basis of our "When you’re Ready" campaign and we set up a website".
Robert’s career as a community social worker in Holland took a twist in 1979 when he accepted on a one year exchange programme in America. It was at the tail end of de-instutionalisation in the US with many former patients living on the streets, in motels or private institutions. As a social worker Robert had to place people into resthomes and supported care, if they could no longer cope.
"It was a bit of an eye opener and I was working with mainly black clients. It was my first serious exposure to racial issues".
He was encouraged by New Zealanders he had worked with there to try life in Aotearoa.
"It was the tail end of Dutch immigration. When I applied for my visa at the New Zealand embassy in The Hague, I basically had a cup of tea and a chat; and as long as you had your tax and police certifcates sorted out, you got your visa".
His first foray into New Zealand’s public health system saw him in a social worker role at Middlemore Hospital. There he met his wife Sue Geary who today is a staff nurse at Auckland Hospital. They have five children.
Two years at Carrington and Oakley hospitals put him in touch with people he still sees today including Timoti George (Te Atea Marino unit manager), Margaret Honeyman (Clinical Director mental health) and Audrey Walsh (manager regional forensic psychiatry unit, the Mason Clinic).
He has also worked for four years with the Auckland Drug Dependency Clinic methadone service. Next job was at Higher Ground Drug Rehab Trust, which he managed for 10 years and was, "everything from the handyman to the accountant to the social worker and everything in between".
He worked hard to ensure the organisation, which was barely surviving, became self-sustaining.
"Higher Ground is still going today and I feel really good about that," he says.
He has also worked with the Problem Gambling Foundation and after that came to Waitemata in 2002 as clinical advisor for RADS.
Not only is he a qualified social worker but he has also completed post graduate degree in Human Resources management (1994) and a masters degree in Health Science (2003), both at Auckland University.
"Alcohol and drug abuse problems are very common," he says.
"Across a lifetime 20 to 30 percent of the population will take or use a substance in a abusive manner at some stage. If you’re going to stop you have to look at how you’re going to cope with the change in lifestyle.
"What will be the replacement for drug of choice? People have to have something to fill that gap. For some people that’s religion, children or their partner."
Societal, family and personal issues that influence addictive behaviour will no doubt keep CADS staff very busy for a long time to come.
