Professors Charles McGhee and Helen Danesh-Meyer

Auckland-based consultant ophthalmologists and researchers Professors Charles McGhee and Helen Danesh-Meyer have both been named in The Ophthalmologist’s prestigious annual Power List. The list highlights the, “Top 100 most influential people in the world of ophthalmology” and is selected by an international panel of 20 judges from more than 450 candidates nominated by their peers.

Prof McGhee ONZM is the Maurice Paykel professor and chair of ophthalmology and founding director of the New Zealand National Eye Centre (NZNEC) at Auckland University, heading up a team of more than 120 ophthalmologists, optometrists and visual scientists, and is a consulting corneal specialist at Eye Institute. Specialising in corneal disease and transplantation, anterior segment tumours, complex cataract surgery and ocular trauma repair, he has co-written two major textbooks and published more than 400 peer-reviewed papers, supervised 82 clinical and research fellows and 39 doctoral theses, generating $30 million in competitive research grants and philanthropic funding. A past president of the Asia Pacific Academy of Ophthalmology, this is the third time in nine years that Prof McGhee has been named on the list.

Prof Charles McGhee

“When I relocated to New Zealand-Aotearoa in 1999, I appreciated this was a forward thinking, can do, fix it with number-8 wire country, and over the years with the support of philanthropy, colleagues and the University of Auckland we have built an exceptional clinical and laboratory research team with the same can-do attitude, despite limited research funding,” said Prof McGhee. “I really believe this award recognises the teams as much as the individuals who are named in the Top-100, and it is a great, great honour to have led and grown this Kiwi team over the last two decades and hopefully into the future.”

Prof Danesh-Meyer was the first female professor of ophthalmology in New Zealand. She is head of the Academic Neuro-ophthalmology and Glaucoma Research Unit of the NZNEC, chair of Glaucoma New Zealand and a consulting glaucoma and neuro-ophthalmology specialist at Eye Institute. She has co-authored textbooks and published more than 200 scientific papers. Her contribution to ophthalmology and research was recognised in last year’s ‘100 most influential female ophthalmologists internationally’, the first time The Power List had focused on female ophthalmologists.

Prof Helen Danesh-Meyer

Prof Danesh-Meyer said she thought New Zealand should be particularly proud of this recognition. “It is a credit to the research environment that Charles has built for over 20 years. While it may be Charles and I recognised now, there are several dynamic young women and men in who I believe will continue to keep New Zealand well represented on the international stage.”

Profs McGhee and Danesh-Meyer were joined on this year’s Power List by three Australian-based ophthalmologists: Professors Stephanie Watson, Keith Martin and Graham Barrett. “With more than 220,000 ophthalmologists in the world, it highlights the prominence of New Zealand and Australian ophthalmology and visual sciences that five of the international Top-100 are from Australasia,” said Prof McGhee.

“The 2022 Power List is not only inspirational but also reflective of the brilliance found in so many corners of this wonderful field,” said The Ophthalmologist. “Over the past few years, we have seen some changing trends among the final 100 names. For example, you had to look hard to find a woman on the 2016 list – just 10 women among 90 men. This year, we are delighted that the number of women has risen to 36. Can we credit last year’s all-female Power List with the upward swing? Well, showcasing just 100 of the many highly talented women in the field certainly didn’t hurt.”