Around 76 senior managers and staff at Tauranga and Whakatane hospitals are spending the day with their buddies today.

Buddy Day is the nationwide event when people carry cardboard cut-outs of children (known as ‘buddies') around with them throughout their working days as a way of highlighting the message of keeping children safe.

BOPDHB Chief Operating Officer Pete Chandler spending time with his ‘buddy' on Buddy Day.

Bay of Plenty District Health Board staff and management - including Chief Operating Officer Pete Chandler - have taken the message on enthusiastically.

'It's up to all of us to look out for our children and to be ever mindful of child welfare,” says Chief Operating Officer Pete Chandler.

'They are key themes of Buddy Day and it's a great reminder for us all of our responsibilities in those areas, both as health professionals and individuals.

'It's perhaps a cliché but it does take a community to raise a child, and the hospital is a focal point of our community, so we take that very seriously.”

Pete says Buddy Day is about starting conversations around child welfare and this is a great way of doing it.

He says carrying a buddy with you naturally does that, people are interested in what you're doing.

'From a hospital perspective we also use Buddy Day as a way to stress the importance of getting children to their health appointments. We can help parents and guardians if they're having problems attending, we can work together to get the kids here, which is the important thing at the end of the day.”