Jennifer Kruger graduated with a BSc (Nursing and Midwifery) from University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg.

She has over 15 years of experience in the field of midwifery, before returning to complete a MSc, at the University of Auckland in 2003, on Childbirth in Elite Athlete. She developed an interest in Sport and Exercise, being a recreational runner for many years and completing a few half marathons and one full marathon. Further development of this theme led to a PhD in Pelvic floor muscle function in the Elite Athlete, completed in 2008. During this time she tutored and taught the undergraduate Human Anatomy paper.

She held a six month post doctoral fellowship at the University of Montreal with the Centre de recherché de geriatrie de Montreal, using ultrasound imaging to investigate pelvic floor muscle function in elderly women with urinary incontinence.

In 2009, Jennifer joined the Auckland Bioengineering Institute as a postdoctoral fellow holding one of the inaugural Postdoctoral Rutherford Fellowships through the Royal Society of New Zealand. She started, and still leads the Pelvic floor research group at the Auckland Bioengineering Institute, whose focus is pelvic floor muscle function and dysfunction in women. In 2011 an Aoteoroa Bioengineering Fellowship sponsored by the Julian Robertson Foundation, led to a series of projects which have cumulated in development of instrumentation to measure pelvic floor function. This specialised instrumentation is now in the process of commercialisation.

Jennifer enjoys the challenges of bringing ‘clinician and engineer’ together. Realising the possibilities that bioengineering can add to clinical decision making and what clinicians really need from the bioengineer.



Distinctions/Honours:
Best Doctoral Thesis award 2009

Committee/Professional groups/Services:
Pelvic Floor Reseach Network (NZ)

Qualifications:
BSc Witw., MSc PhD

Areas of Expertise:
- Pelvic floor disorders in women
- Pelvic floor ultrasound
- Bio-instrumentation development