invited speakers
Amal Abou-Hamden
Associate Professor Amal Abou-Hamden, is a Senior Consultant Neurosurgeon at the Royal Adelaide Hospital and the Women’s and Children’s Hospital, Visiting specialist at Calvary Adelaide Hospital and clinical Associate Professor at the University of Adelaide.
Amal is the Chair of RACS, South Australia, Examiner at the RACS Neurosurgery Court of Examiners and SA representative at the RACS Neurosurgery Education and Training board and Research Committee.
She is the Vascular Neurosurgery Lead, Director of Neurovascular fellowship and Neurosurgery Education and Training programs at the Royal Adelaide and Women’s and Children’s Hospitals. She continues to be at the forefront of advancing surgical care, working within neuro-oncology and epilepsy surgery multidisciplinary teams, chairing the Neurovascular MDM, establishing and managing clinical specialty databases, and incorporating the latest evidence-based technology and clinical protocols to improve patient recovery and achieve the best possible outcomes. She is active in clinical research and post-graduate student supervision and has been Principal and Chief Investigator for a number of National and International Clinical Trials.
James Aitken
James Aitken is a General and Colorectal Surgeon in Perth. He has long standing interest in surgical
quality. He is Clinical Director of the
Western Australian Audit of Surgical Mortality and the clinical lead for the
Australian and New Zealand Emergency Laparotomy Audit
In
1998 he helped establish the Western Australian Audit of Surgical Mortality
that in 2005 became the Australian and New Zealand Audit of Surgical Mortality.
In 2016 he supervised the Perth Emergency Laparotomy Audit. He is
chair of the Australian and New Zealand Audit Emergency Laparotomy Audit –
Quality Improvement working party.
Patrick Bade
Patrick Bade has been a General Surgeon in Darwin since 1996. Past Head of General Surgery Department and Chair of NT RACS branch. 20-year history of the EMST instructor at Royal Darwin Hospital. All on a .4 FTE Rdh contract.
Bernard Carney
Dr Bernard Carney is a consultant plastic and reconstructive surgeon having gained his FRACS in 2005. He is currently head of Burn Service at the Adelaide Women's and Children's Hospital and a visiting specialist in plastic and reconstructive surgery at both the Women's and Children's Hospital and the Queen Elizabeth Hospital. He is a clinical lecturer at the University of Adelaide.
His clinical interests include burn surgery, hand surgery, rural health, aesthetic surgery and body recontouring surgery.
As the head of the Burns unit at the children's hospital, he provides acute and reconstructive care of children with burn injury, with a particular interest in introduction of new technology such as laser treatment of burn scars. The foundation of this work was laid with an interest in burn surgery as a trainee, involvement in the Bali burns disaster in 2002 is a member of the Burns Assessment Team from the Royal Adelaide Hospital sent to Darwin and a subsequent year spent as the inaugural Burns Fellow across the campuses of both the Royal Adelaide Hospital burns unit and Women's and Children's Hospital burns unit in Adelaide.
In addition to his work in Adelaide, he has had a long-term commitment to delivery of plastic surgery care to communities in the mid North of South Australian and has had long-term roles in professional representation and college duties. He is currently Vice Chair of the South Australian State Committee of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons.
Bridget Clancy
Dr Clancy is a rural OHNS Surgeon, AICD graduate, Chair Rural Surgery Section, Vice Chair Rural Health Equity Steering Committee RACS (implementing RACS Rural Health Equity Strategic Action Plan), AMA Diversity Equity Inclusion Committee Member, Beyond Science Advisory Committee Member, National Rural Health Alliance Council Member, ASOHNS Indigenous Health Committee Member, Former Diversity and Inclusion Advisor, ASOHNS Federal Council and 2019 Telstra Business Women’s Award finalist. Recent publications: Retention of Rural Physicians and Surgeons in Rural Areas: What Works? Kumar & Clancy JPubH 2020, Excellence through Equity: Royal Australasian College of Surgeons Rural Health Equity Strategic Action Plan ANZJS 2022, Excellence through Equity: Responding to Community Need ANZJS 2023
Mark de Souza
Mark is a Darwin-born senior Emergency Specialist at Royal Darwin Hospital who initiated and has chaired NT Health’s Sustainable Healthcare Committee since 2021. Over the past decade he was involved in numerous disaster training programs and Ausmat medical responses to extreme weather events in the Asia Pacific region. In 2019 he began advocating for NT Health to implement climate adaptation, mitigation and decarbonization efforts, and is a member of the national SustainHealth SIG of Doctors for the Environment. He leads the RDH Campus Greening Project that provides staff and patients with access to biophilic spaces which improve wellbeing through enhanced engagement with nature and promote adaptation to a warming climate.
Christopher Dobbins
Christopher Dobbins is a BHI Alumni and is currently the Head of Unit of the Trauma Surgery and Surgical Oncology Unit at the Royal Adelaide Hospital in Adelaide, South Australia.
David Fletcher
Emeritus Professor Surgery University West Australia. Emeritus Consultant Surgeon Fiona Stanley Fremantle Hospital Group (FSFHG). Retired as fulltime Surgeon and Clinical Director Surgical Services Fremantle Hospital (1994 – 2015) and Head Department General Surgery FSFHG 2020 after 50 years in public service.
Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, General Surgery Elected Councillor, Chair Environmental Sustainability Working Party, Deputy Chair Health Priority and Advocacy Committee, member of both Australian and Aotearoa New Zealand General Surgery Training Committees, member WA State Committee RACS.
Stephen Honeybul
Previous State-wide Director of Neurosurgery in Western Australia, a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, The Australasian college of Surgeons and a member of the Neurological Society of Australasia. Past member of the Neurosurgical Training Board of Australia and Past Chief Examiner for the FRACS in Neurosurgery. Current interests involve clinical ethics and stem cell driven cranial reconstruction.
David King
David King is a Vascular Surgeon at the Royal Adelaide Hospital and in the private sector with experience in open and endovascular approaches to vascular disease and an interest in trauma surgery. He is the Chair of the Early Management of Severe Trauma Committee for Australia and New Zealand and has taught as an EMST instructor for 20 years. He sits on many RACS committees including the Trauma Committee, Environmental Sustainability in Surgical Practice Working Party, he is the Deputy-Chair of the Prevocational and Skills Education Committee and is the immediate Past-Chair of the RACS South Australian State Committee.
He is also a supporter of several non-surgical charities, notably as a Director of the Wyndham Richardson Scholarship Fund for the last 10 years and as a member of the Australian Government Leadership Group of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.
Given these interests, he is a passionate advocate for universal access to both environmentally and financially sustainable healthcare and surgical training.
Michael Levitt
Michael is a colorectal surgeon who has been in continuous clinical practice in Perth since 1990. Currently he is a consultant medical executive for the WA Country Health Service, a Director of St John of God Health Care and a Clinician Member of the Medical Board of WA. He has held a number of leadership positions in public and private hospitals, the RACS and the Colorectal Surgical Society of Australia and New Zealand.
He has a particular clinical interest in proctology and functional bowel disease and has published a number of books for the general public on this topic. More recently, he has published a novel about the art world entitled The Gallerist. In 2003, he was awarded a Centenary Medal for services to public education about bowel cancer and was nominated for Australian of the Year (Western Australian branch) in 2018. He continues to be actively involved in community and not-for-profit board roles.
Andrew MacCormick
Andrew MacCormick is a General Surgeon who undertook his fellowship in Upper GI and Bariatric surgery. He is an Associate Professor in the Department of Surgery, University of Auckland and a Consultant Surgeon at Middlemore Hospital, Counties Manukau Te Whatu Ora. Andrew works as a Bariatric and Upper GI surgeon and he is also Director of Trauma.
Andrew has been very active in the environmental sustainability of healthcare. He also conducts Surgical Health Services Research with an interest in disparities in healthcare. He is currently the Chair of the Aotearoa New Zealand National Committee of RACS.
Greg McAnulty
He completed his specialty training in the UK was appointed as a consultant in Intensive Care Medicine and Anaesthesia in 1999 at St George’s Hospital, London. He worked in General Adult and Neuro Critical Care and provided anaesthesia for thoracic surgery. He was director of the Cardiothoracic Intensive Care Unit at St George’s from 1999 until 2005. He was director of Post-graduate Medical Education at St George’s from 2004 until 2007 and until 2015 was director of the St George’s Simulation and Skills Centre. Additionally, he was an Independent Assessor for the Unrelated Live Transplant Regulatory Authority and subsequently for the Human Tissue Authority in the UK. He returned to St George's at the beginning of 2021 during the Covid pandemic.
He worked with Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) in Bosnia in 1995-1996, became a board member in 2000 and was president of MSF UK for four years. He also served on the MSF International Council Board. He worked with MSF in Sierra Leone during the Ebola outbreak of 2014-5 and with other medical aid organisations in west Africa and elsewhere. He was a member of the MSF UK Volunteer Link support programme from 2011 to 2016.
In 2007-8 and from the end of 2015 until the beginning of 2022 he was a consultant in Intensive Care Alice Springs Hospital and is now Medical Director of Clinical Governance there. He is also State Medical Director for DonateLife in the NT.
He became Medical Director of the NT Regional Training Hub with Flinders University in April 2022
John North
John is an orthopaedic surgeon who cares for the peoples of north west Queensland via Telehealth fracture clinics. He is also the Clinical Director of the Queensland Audit of Surgical Mortality and its Northern Territory counterpart. He is an Associate Professor with the University of Queensland. He has worked for the peoples of Queensland for over fifty years through Queensland Health appointments. He teaches regularly on ‘non -technical skills’ and ‘safer surgical teamwork’ required by surgeons and their teams to deliver high quality, compassionate care to all communities and individuals. He has co-authored an online learning tool titled ‘Scalpel to Skin” looking at training in these areas for those seeking to progress to becoming surgeons. He has been heavily involved in rural care delivery for almost fifteen years through telehealth and has researched and published on this subject with respect to evaluation of orthopaedic telehealth service delivery and rural and remote care access. Compassionate care for all patients remains his priority.
Simon Quilty
Simon Quilty worked in the Northern Territory for just under 20 years. With a background in engineering prior to studying medicine, Simon has always had a deep appreciation of the industrial requirements that are necessary for the practice of medicine, right through to the remotest corners of the Territory. Over his tenure in the NT, Simon was involved in numerous attempts to drive more sustainable and resilient practices into healthcare within the Northern Territory. He is now Medical Advisor for the Purple House which provides dialysis to 19 of Australia’s most remote communities - an organisation that will soon be carbon neutral and is rapidly embracing renewable, resilient and environmentally responsible models of clinical service delivery in the NT, proving that these objectives are not only possible, but immediately achievable.
Maria Savvas
Maria is an experienced lawyer and the principal of her own legal practice. Maria is experienced in a variety of legal areas, including professional negligence, insurance law, administrative law, personal injury and statutory compensation, disciplinary matters, coronial inquests and civil disputes. Maria is a strong legal professional with a Bachelor of Laws (LLB) from the Northern Territory University.
Ronnie Taylor
Emergency / Acute Care Nurse Practitioner. My nursing journey as an Enrolled Nurse in Alice Springs Hospital started in 1982. People were still coming into town from the Western Desert, and exotic diseases like Granuloma Inguinale and Hansen’s still existed. Moving to the ED was an immediate love affair for me. Never a dull moment, never knowing what was coming in next, and the very robust humorous staff. We were often able to make a critical difference at the worst time in people’s lives, with minimal resources. Disasters saw me work though the East Timor crisis, 2 Bali Bombings, and the Ashmore Reef Disaster. I am fortunate enough to be an AUSMAT member, and this allowed me to work in disaster zones in Pakistan, the Philippines, Kiribati, Fiji, East Timor and Samoa. I have been able to teach in Indonesia, East Timor, and East Africa. After 42 years in the job I am winding down, and currently working for Western Australian Emergency Telehealth via my office in Darwin.
John Treacy
John Zorbas
I am a specialist emergency physician with the Australasian College for Emergency Medicine (ACEM) and a specialist intensive care physician with the College of Intensive Care Medicine (CICM). I also have interests and experience in health policy, health informatics, clinical redesign and point of care ultrasound.
CONTACT US
SA State Office P:+61 8 8239 1000 E:college.sa@surgeons.org
WA State Office P:+61 8 6389 8600 E:college.wa@surgeons.org
ABN 29 004 167 766