Helen Danesh-Meyer

Dame Helen Victoria Danesh-Meyer (born ) is a New Zealand ophthalmology academic, and since 2008 is a full professor at the University of Auckland. She is the first female professor of ophthalmology in New Zealand, and the second female professor in any surgical speciality in New Zealand. In 2025 Danesh-Meyer was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society Te Apārangi.

Early life Danesh-Meyer was born in to Iranian parents—her mother was a gynaecologist and her father a psychiatrist—and lived in various cities of the United States until the age of 14, when her father was appointed to a position as a psychiatrist at the University of Otago and the family moved to Dunedin. There she was educated at Logan Park High School, before going on to study medicine at the University of Otago, graduating MB ChB in 1991. and in 2013 she completed a PhD with a thesis titled Evaluation of optic nerve morphology in non-glaucomatous optic neuropathies with quantitative optic nerve imaging modalities, also at the University of Auckland.

Danesh-Meyer joined the staff at Auckland in 2001 as an associate professor, and was appointed the Sir William and Lady Stevenson Professor of Ophthalmology in 2008. She is the first female professor of ophthalmology in New Zealand, and the second female professor in any surgical speciality in New Zealand. In 2022, she co-founded Vision Research Foundation and acts as its scientific director and chair. Vision Research Foundation focuses on supporting early- and mid-career vision researchers in New Zealand.

Danesh-Meyer has been an author or co-author of over 200 peer-reviewed publications. Her work has linked retinal nerve thinning to dementia and inflammation pathways relevant to eye diseases.

Honours In the 2023 New Year Honours, Danesh-Meyer was appointed a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to ophthalmology. In March 2025, she was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society Te Apārangi "for being an international leader in the field of neuro-ophthalmic disorders". In the 2026 New Year Honours, Danesh-Meyer was promoted to Dame Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to ophthalmology.

Danesh-Meyer has received several awards from the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Ophthalmologists, including the 2022 College Medal and the Dorothy Potter Medal, and she gave the 2022 Dame Ida Mann Lecture.

Selected works