Speakers
Prof David Jayne
Director of NIHR Global Surgery Research Group – Surgical Technologies, University of Leeds
David is Bowel Cancer UK & RCS Engl. Professor of Surgery at the University of Leeds and Hon. Consultant Surgeon at LTHT. His clinical interests include robotic and minimally invasive surgery for colorectal cancer and pelvic floor dysfunction. His research interests include the development of new surgical technologies and devices for minimally invasive surgery.
In 2012 he was awarded an NIHR Research Professorship to accelerate research and implementation of new technologies into clinical practice. He is currently an NIHR Senior Investigator. He is Chief Investigator for several NIHR portfolio clinical trials, including MRC/EME/NIHR ROLARR (robotic versus laparoscopic surgery for rectal cancer), HTA/NIHR FIAT (fistula plug versus surgeon’s preference for fistula-in-ano), HTA/NIHR SaFaRI (sacral nerve stimulation versus Fenix magnetic anal sphincter for adult faecal incontinence), and MRC/EME/NIHR IntAct (Fluorescence perfusion angiography to prevent anastomotic leak in rectal cancer surgery).
He is Clinical Director of the Leeds NIHR Medical Devices and in vitro Diagnostics Co-operative in Surgical Technologies, a national network of clinicians, academics, patient & public representatives, and commercial partners to develop novel solutions to address unmet surgical need. His position as Clinical Director for the Leeds NIHR Global Health Research Group affords him the opportunity to apply his expertise in the clinical translation of surgical technologies to the context of low resource countries.
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Prof Jenny Dankelman
Head of the Department of Biomechanical Engineering at Delft University of Technology, Professor of Minimally Invasive Techniques
Jenny Dankelman is professor in Minimally Invasive Surgery and Interventional Techniques at the Delft University of Technology (www.MISIT.nl). She obtained her degree in Mathematics, with a specialisation in System and Control Engineering at the University of Groningen in 1984 and her PhD at the Delft University of Technology (DUT) in 1989. In 2001 she was awarded the Antoni van Leeuwenhoek chair and shortly after she became head of the Minimally Invasive Surgery and Interventional Techniques group (www.MISIT.nl). Between 2010 and 2014 she was head of the Department of BioMechanical Engineering and in 2013 she became Medical Delta professor. She was awarded a Royal award and became Knight in the Order of the Netherlands Lion in 2018, and recently she became member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW).
Her research focuses on minimally invasive surgery, needle interventions and endovascular interventions. Her research group cooperates with several hospitals such as Leiden UMCwhere she holds a part time professorship position, Erasmus MC Rotterdam and the AMCAmsterdam. Her interests and research projects are in the fields of designing novel medical instruments, haptics, training and simulation systems, and patient safety, with the focus on minimally invasive techniques. A few years ago she started a number of projects to develop affordable multi-functional surgical instruments and an innovative surgical equipment system that allows minimally invasive surgery without the need for a sterile operating room, which is especially relevant to low-resource settings.
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Adriana Velazquez Berumen, MSc
WHO Lead on Medical Devices
Adriana Velazquez Berumen is a Mexican Biomedical Engineer, and has worked in public and private hospitals in Mexico. She has been elected member of Boards of National and international organisations (IFMBE, CORAL, INAHTA etc). She was the founder and Director General of CENETEC in Ministry of Health in Mexico.
Currently, Ms Velazquez Berumen works as the coordinator of Medical Devices in WHO works to increase access to appropriate, affordable, quality, safe medical devices globally.
She is responsible for the Compendium of Innovative Technologies for low resource settings and Medical Devices Technical Series Books, among many other WHO projects.
Dr William Bolton - Hackathon leader
Academic Foundation Doctor, Director/Co-Founder of MedTech Foundation
Dr William Bolton is an Academic Foundation Doctor and NIHR Clinical Research Fellow in the Global Health Research Group Surgical Technologies in Leeds UK, taking time out of clinical training to complete a PhD exploring surgical technologies for application in low and middle-income countries. His research interests include the development and evaluation of novel surgical technology, its applications to low-resource settings and clinical trial design in Global Surgery.
In his current role he works closely with the Leeds Royal College of Surgeons of England Surgical Trials Centre, NIHR Surgical MedTech Cooperative, the Leeds Innovation in Surgical Technologies Network and the Nuffield Centre for International Health and Development. His clinical interests include essential and emergency surgery, general surgery, trauma and orthopaedic surgery, plastic and reconstructive surgery, extreme medicine and emergency medicine. He is a board member of the NIHR Surgical MedTech Cooperative where he is Director Co-Founder of the student and trainee-led affiliated group, the MedTech Foundation. He is also an advisory board member of the National MedTech Skills Academy and a Management Team member of the University Of Leeds School Of Medicine MBChB Enterprise Programme.
Dr Jesudian Gnanaraj
Rural Surgeon, Board member of G4 Alliance
Dr Gnanaraj Gnanaraj Jesudian is a Urologist and General Surgeon trained from CMC Vellore with passion for rural surgery. He started the Kukna tribals Development in the Dangs District (population of 600000 with no doctors) of Gujarat. He then worked with Emmanuel Hospital Association where he trained doctors and surgeons rural areas performing over 80000 surgical procedures in rural areas empowering more than 30 rural hospitals to start minimally invasive surgeries.
He has won innovations awards such as the EHA award, Barkar Memorial award (Tropical Doctor), Antia Finseth award (Association of Rural Surgeons of India), DST Lockheed Martin award, Millennium Alliance awards (Government of India), GE Healthcare award, Lancet Surgical Champion award and WHO Compendium of Medical Devices award.
He has over 300 publications and is currently the President of the Association of Rural Surgeons of India, a member of the Board of Directors of the G4 Alliance, Joint Secretary of the International Federation of Rural Surgeons and Adjunct Professor in Karunya University. He is the Project Lead for India of the NIHR – GHRG project at the University of Leeds. He is currently working on devices and techniques like the Gas Insufflation Less Laparoscopic Surgeries and a Laptop Cystoscope to take modern surgery to the poor and the marginalized in rural and remote areas, as well as training and empowering rural surgeons.
Dr Shobi Nagraj
MRC Clinical Research Fellow in Global Maternal Child Health, University of Oxford
Dr Nagraj is a primary care physician with a special interest in global maternal child health. She completed a degree in medical anthropology before training as a surgeon, specialising in paediatric surgery. After working for a few months in Malawi, Dr Nagraj experienced first-hand the importance of the social determinants of health and returned to the UK to conduct health services research at the University of Cambridge, where she completed an MPhil in Primary Care Research Methods.
During her time as a clinician and medical educator, Dr Nagraj has worked closely with rural communities and community healthcare workers in low resource-settings in India and Malawi. She is passionate about providing high quality, evidence-based care to rural populations.
Her DPhil project involves adopting a life-course approach to women's health and the prevention of non-communicable diseases. She is investigating the development of a complex intervention using mHealth technology in the context of rural India to screen, refer and manage women with high-risk pregnancies in the postpartum period.
Mr Tim Beacon
CEO of Medical Aid International
Mr Beacon has spent 13 years in the Orthopaedic Medical Devices industry, focusing on Trauma, spinal surgery and joint replacement. His journey into healthcare has been an inspirational and unconventional one. He initially trained as an Operating Department Practitioner and subsequently became an Assistant Training Co-ordinator for the NW Thames Health Authority. During that time, Mr Beacon set up an outdoors adventure training company, running personal development courses, predominantly for healthcare staff, these received approval from Royal Colleges and were included as modules on degree courses, with one filmed as part of an ITV series on the John Radcliffe hospital, Oxford.
During his career, Mr Beacon has been a University healthcare lecturer and a civilian lecturer on the UK Special Forces Patrol Medical Course. He is the only civilian to have ever completed this course, and this came in particularly useful when running Primary Trauma Foundation courses in Africa. Mr Beacon has a post-graduate diploma in Travel Health at Glasgow Medical School and has written a book called “The Gap Year Handbook: An Essential Guide to Adventure Travel”. He has also completed and spoken on the ‘Anaesthesia for Developing Countries’ Course run by the University of Oxford.
Thomas G Weiser MD MPH FACS
Associate Professor, Department of Surgery, Section of Trauma and Critical Care
Stanford University Medical Center
Thomas Weiser is an associate professor in the Department of Surgery at Stanford University Medical Center, where he practices general, emergency, and trauma surgery and surgical intensive care. He is also a Visiting Professor at the University of Edinburgh working with colleagues at the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh and the GlobalSurg collaborative. He is the clinical advisor for Lifebox, a charity dedicated to improving surgical safety worldwide.
