Rate My Professor Jenny Visser

Dr Jenny Visser is a Senior Lecturer in Travel Medicine and Postgraduate Travel Medicine Programme Leader in the Department of Primary Health Care and General Practice at the University of Otago, Wellington, within the Faculty of Medicine. She holds a BSc in zoology and botany, MB ChB, Postgraduate Diploma in Travel Medicine, Master of Travel Medicine, Postgraduate Certificate in General Practice, and is a Fellow of the Royal New Zealand College of General Practitioners (FRNZCGP). Prior to her specialization in travel medicine, Visser worked as a full-time general practitioner in Ngaio, Wellington, for 12 years until 2004, with additional experience as a locum, in rural hospitals, and as an expedition doctor. Since 1999, she has led the University of Otago's postgraduate interdisciplinary Travel Medicine programme from the Wellington campus. She convenes papers in Travel Medicine and Wilderness and Expedition Medicine, and co-convenes the Tropical Infectious Diseases paper. Currently, she divides her time between academic duties at the University and clinical travel medicine practice at The Travel Doctor TMVC in Wellington.

Visser's research interests include travel medicine, post-travel screening for New Zealand Police officers deploying overseas, and rabies post-exposure management in international travellers. She has served as ship’s doctor on eight six-week voyages aboard NIWA’s research vessel Tangaroa to Antarctica, most recently in 2021, treating a range of conditions from routine general practice issues to emergencies, and contributing to biological sampling on the 2004 BioRoss voyage. Her analysis of patterns of illness and injury from these Antarctic research cruises (2004-2019) was published in the Journal of Travel Medicine (2020). Other expeditions include four months volunteering in Machermo at 4,500 metres altitude in the Himalayas, providing medical support for the Mr Pip film crew in Bougainville, and treks in the Fiji highlands, up Mt Kilimanjaro, and along the Great Wall of China. Key publications are 'Streamlining malaria prevention recommendations for travellers: current and future approaches' (Journal of Travel Medicine, 2024), 'Advising travellers beyond infectious diseases: Can we learn from our forebears?' (2022), 'Adaptation of travel medicine practitioners to the COVID-19 pandemic' (Journal of Travel Medicine, 2022), and 'Free falling: Characteristics and prevention of injury and death in extreme aerial sports tourists' (International Journal of Travel Medicine & Global Health, 2022).