Dr Jacqueline Short
MBChB, BA, FRCPsych, CCST General Adult & Forensic Psychiatry, Dip. Forensic Psychotherapy, Dip. Social Policy & Criminology, Affiliate RANZCP.
Jackie has over 25 years’ experience as a forensic psychiatrist. Initially a general nurse in the Royal Navy and then a psychiatric nurse, Jackie re-trained in medicine in the UK, specialising in psychiatry and further in forensic psychiatry. She has a particular interest in the mental health of women in secure environments and family violence. She has worked in both public and private sectors in a range of secure health and prison settings; provided medico-legal opinions across a range of courts in both UK and NZ and assisted the UK Ombudsman and the Office of the Inspector of Custodial Services for WA. In 2000, she set up the first dedicated medium secure forensic service for women in S. Wales, cited by DOH as an example of best practice in the development of a service and commended by the Mental Health Act Commission and the Care Standards Inspectorate for Wales.
Jackie came to Aotearoa NZ in 2004 to further develop secure forensic mental health services for women. She chaired a national working party looking at care standards for women in secure services in Aotearoa NZ and was the inaugural chair of the Women in Secure Care Committee, tasked with implementing the working party’s 2009 Report. In 2016, a small medium secure facility for women opened as part of the Central Regional Forensic and Rehabilitation Service, the second largest forensic mental health service in Aotearoa NZ, of which she has been the Clinical Director since 2018.
Jackie is a former Chair of the Overseas Trained Psychiatrists Committee of the RANZCP and a former executive committee member of the New Zealand branch of the Forensic Faculty of the RANZCP. She is also a former Chair and Deputy Chair of the Family Violence Death Review Committee for Aotearoa NZ and is the NZ representative on the RANZCP committee for the Family Violence Psychiatric Network.
Over the last 20+ years, Jackie has spoken at numerous national and international conferences and facilitated workshops and seminars on women’s mental health, trauma and family violence. In her spare time, Jackie aspires to be on Masterchef and to do nothing in the Pacific Islands.