Trustees

Head of Gastroenterology at Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital (Wits).

Prof Reid Ally graduated from the University of the Witwatersrand with his FCP in 1986. He was appointed adjunct Professor of Medicine in 2001. He is the current Head of Gastroenterology (Wits), Principal Physician and Head of the Medical Unit at the Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital. He is the Director of the African Institute of Digestive Disease and Past President of the South African Gastroenterology Society (SAGES)

His mission is to promote Gastroenterology as a dynamic/scientific Subspecialty especially to the younger physicians and to improve relations/needs between academic and private Gastroenterologist. He has a special interest in maintaining the SAADD as a centre for training in Gastroenterology within Sub Saharan Africa and encouraging industry/R+D participations.

Currently serves as one of the Hepatologists at WDGMC. He completed his gastroenterology training at Chris Hani Baragwanath Academic hospital in 2014 and then worked with Prof Ernie Song for a further 18 months in the Hepatology clinic at WDGMC. His current interests include Autoimmune Hepatitis and Portal hypertension and its complications in the sub-saharan setting and transplant hepatology.

Geoffrey Dusheiko, FCP(SA) FRCS, is Emeritus Professor of Medicine at the Royal Free Hospital and University College London School of Medicine and Consultant Hepatologist at Kings College Hospital London, in London, UK.

After earning his MBBS degree from the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, he completed his internship and residency in Johannesburg. His fellowships were conducted at the Johannesburg Hospital Liver Unit and the National Institutes of Health, Maryland, and the University of Minnesota, USA.

His research interests include the management and treatment of HCV and HBV and small hepatocellular carcinoma; he has a special interest in research on viral hepatitis, especially viral genotyping, applied molecular virology, the natural history of chronic viral hepatitis and antiviral therapies. A member of several organisations, including EASL, AASLD and IASL, Professor Dusheiko is also a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians, the Royal College of Physicians of South Africa, and the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

He previously served as Educational Councilor on the Governing Board of EASL for 4 years and was the recipient of the EASL Recognition Award in 2014. An advisor for the UK National Institute of Health and Care Excellence, he was a Director of the Skipton Fund, a UK ex gratia payment scheme for patients infected with HCV through contaminated blood products. He served as interim Director of the Blood Safety, HIV, viral hepatitis and STI Division of Public Health England in 2019. He serves as an advisor to the National Medical Research Council, Singapore, the TherVacB Consortium (European Horizon Grant) and the A-Tango Consortium (EUH2020 grant) and on WHO guideline groups. He is a co-editor of Alimentary Pharmacology and Therapeutics, and has previously served on editorial boards for the Journal of Viral Hepatitis, Hepatology, Best Practice & Research Clinical Gastroenterology, and Gut among others. Professor Dusheiko has authored or co-authored more than 500 articles in international peer-reviewed journals or books.

Eduard Jonas MB, ChB (Pret), MMed (Stell), FCS (SA), PhD (Karolinska Institutet) Eduard Jonas underwent his pre-graduate training at the University of Pretoria, South Africa obtaining a MBChB in 1985. He did his surgical training at the University of Stellenbosch and becoming a Fellow of the South African College of Surgeons in 1995 and obtaining a MMed in general surgery.

He served as consultant surgeon in the Upper Gastrointestinal Service of the Department of General Surgery at Tygerberg hospital before taking up an endoscopy fellowship position at Karolinska University Hospital, Stocholm, Sweden in 1997. He obtained a PhD from the Karolinska Institute in 2002 with a thesis on Imaging-based Dynamic Liver Testing. He was affiliated to the Karolinska Institute as associate professor and held several clinical positions in Karolinska Institute affiliated hospitals, including Head of Endoscopy at Danderyd Hospital and senior consultant in the Hepato-pancreato-biliary service of Karolinska University Hospital. Since 2015 he is head of Head of Surgical Gastroenterology / Hepatopancreatobiliary Unit at the University of Cape Town and Groote Schuur Hospital.

Founder and Chairman of the Gastroenterology Foundation of SA and a member of SAGES council.

Following his graduation from the University of the Witwatersrand medical school in Johannesburg South Africa in 1979 he completed his fellowship with the College of Physicians and joined the Liver Unit of the National Institutes of Health in Washington DC where he spent a number of years researching the antiviral therapy of Hepaitis B and C viruses. This was followed by GI Fellowships at Georgetown in Washington DC and Cornell Hospital in New York City and a visiting lecturership at the Prince of Wales hospital in Hong Kong. He returned to SA in 1991 and is presently a Gastroenterologist in Private practice in Johannesburg. He is actively involved in the CME of GI/Hepatology fellows, post graduate fellows and gastroenterologists and hepatologists in private practice.

Dr Leolin Katsidzira (Leo) is a gastroenterologist at the University of Zimbabwe, who also runs a private practice in Harare, Zimbabwe. He trained at the University of Zimbabwe (under-graduate and internal medicine) in Harare, Zimbabwe, before doing a gastroenterology fellowship at the University of Cape Town and Groote Schuur hospital in Cape Town, South Africa. He holds a PhD on the epidemiology, and genetics of colorectal cancer in African populations. His main research interests are on the interplay of the environment, genetics, the gut mucosal immunity and the gut microbiota in the emergence of inflammatory bowel disease, colorectal cancer in Africa, and the genesis and complications of environmental enteropathy. He maintains an active research interest in chronic Hepatitis B & C in Africa and is actively involved in the development of clinical and academic gastroenterology on the continent. He has been involved in the drafting of key national, regional, and international gastroenterology guidelines. He is the current President of the National Physicians Association of Zimbabwe, and a council member of the East, Central and Southern Africa College of Physicians (ECSACOP), where he chairs the examinations committee.

Professor Jake Krige is the head of the HPB Surgery and Surgical Gastroenterology units at Groote Schuur Hospital which is a major referral centre for HPB and GI surgery in Southern Africa. He is the editor of the South African Journal of Surgery, has served on the editorial board of seven journals and is a member of eight international and South African surgical societies. In 2002 he received the prestigious University of Cape Town Distinguished Teacher Award. He has been an invited speaker at surgical symposia in England, USA, Australia, France, Egypt, Greece, Israel, Japan, China, Sweden, India and the Czech Republic and has presented scientific papers at international meetings in England, USA, Germany, France, Italy, Australia, Holland, Hong Kong, Egypt, Greece and Spain. He is the author or co-author of 56 invited book chapters, 175 original peer-reviewed articles, 56 editorials and invited commentaries and 210 peer-reviewed published conference papers. Among his published works are 3 citation classics.

President of the Hepato-Pancreato-Biliary Association of South Africa (HPBASA) and Head of HPB Surgery at the Wits University Donald Gordon Medical Centre.

Professor Jose Ramos was born in Mozambique and immigrated to South Africa in 1963. He graduated from University of the Witwatersrand with an MBBCh and obtained the FRCS Primary at the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow in 1985 and before training as a surgeon at the Johannesburg Hospital from 1986 to 1991. He obtained an FCS(SA) in 1991. He was then a consultant and later unit head at the Johannesburg Hospital from 1992 to 2001. During this time he was head of HPB Surgery and joint head of Surgical Gastroenterology. He attained sub-specialty registration as a Surgical Gastroenterologist in 1995. He did postgraduate fellowship training in Los Angeles, Rennes and Paris, having been awarded the Michael and Janie Miller Fellowship and later the Hoechst-Marrion-Roussel Fellowship. He has been in full-time private practice since 2001 first at the Linksfield Park Clinic and then from 2006 at the University of the Witwatersrand Donald Gordon Medical Centre. He is a Senior Lecturer at the University of the Witwatersrand and an Honourary Consultant at the Johannesburg Hospital. He has been associated with the Dept of Surgery, University of the Witwatersrand since 1992 as Lecturer and Senior Lecturer (Honorary). His medical interests are surgical gastroenterology and HPB surgery. In May 2010 he was promoted to Adjunct Professor by the University of the Witwatersrand.

Wendy Spearman is Head of the Division of Hepatology, Department of Medicine, Faculty of Health Sciences at the University of Cape Town and Groote Schuur Hospital. She is Head of the Liver and Liver Transplant clinics at Groote Schuur Hospital. She completed her 2 year Hepatology Fellowship under Professors Ralph Kirsch and Simon Robson at the UCT/MRC Liver Research Centre in 1991 and obtained her PhD in 2008 from the University of Cape Town on “The effect of two novel C-type lectins, Ba100 and Ba25, isolated from the venom of the puff adder, Bitis arietans on T lymphocyte proliferative responses.” She is actively involved in outreach Liver education programmes and is a co-lead of the ‘Viral Hepatitis in sub-Saharan Africa” ECHO Clinic program and co-facilitates the UCT COVID-19 ECHO clinics. She is the lead consultant on the National Guidelines on the management and prevention of viral hepatitis in South Africa. Her research interests include viral hepatitis, liver transplantation, drug-induced liver injuries and novel immunosuppressants.

Professor and Head of the Division of Gastroenterology, University of Cape Town, since January 2011. He completed his undergraduate training at Aberdeen University, Scotland followed by General Surgery training occurred in the Royal Air Force whilst on a short service commission and later at Aberdeen University. He spent two years as Fellow in Surgical Nutrition at Harvard and was awarded ChM thesis on Indirect Calorimetry in surgical patients. A surgical appointment at University of Natal followed and he spent the next twenty-two years at this institution working in its affiliated teaching hospitals. Initially conducting research in trauma and subsequently in surgical aspects of gastroenterology. He established a Surgical Gastroenterology Unit at the now University of KwaZulu Natal in 2005 and continued to develop subspecialty surgery and the infrastructure to support it. He has special expertise in laparoscopic and flexible endoscopy in particular ERCP with periods of specialised training at Cape Town and at Duke University during an American College of Surgeons International Scholarship in 1993.

Previous appointments at UKZN:
Academic Head Surgical Gastroenterology UKZN 2006. Professor of Surgery, Nelson R Mandela School of Medicine, College of Health Sciences, UKZN. 2002
Principal Specialist, HOD, Addington Hospital UKZN, 1999.
Associate Professor, Senior Consultant Surgeon, Addington Hospital, UKZN 1993.
Specialist and Senior Specialist Surgeon 1987 – 1993 King Edward VII Hospital, UN.


Professor Thomson is involved in the administration of post graduate research and acts as an external examiner. He is a Past President of SASES, SRS, SAGES, WGO Tele-education project leader, College of Surgeons of the CMSA; Examiner, Council Member, Past Secretary and Senator.

Gill Watermeyer, Associate Professor of Medicine, Consultant Physician and Gastroenterologist, Division of Gastroenterology at Groote Schuur Hospital, Senior Lecturer, University of Cape Town. MBChB (UCT), FCP (SA), Cert Gastroenterol (CMSA) MPH (with distinction)

Prof Watermeyer initially graduated from the University of Cape Town and subsequently completed her post graduate studies in 2002. Her main research interest focus is on Inflammatory Bowel Disease, intestinal tuberculosis and probiotics. She is head of the largest Inflammatory Bowel Disease Clinic in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Prof Watermeyer is currently Secretary of the South African Gastroenterology Society (SAGES), on the SAGES Guidelines Committee and is a Trustee of the Gastroenterology Foundation of South Africa.