Latest News From Urolink

AUGUST 2024

Read Danielle Whiting’s report about her TUF Fellowship to KCMC for the first percutaneous nephrolithotomy workshop, between 1 and 12 July 2024. Dani emphasises the difficulties there are in bringing higher tech procedures into an LMIC healthcare environment, and the clinical challenges that await their application.  She also experienced, in the raw, the differences there are between what we all expect within the NHS and what is available in circumstances that are even more resource depleted. Dani’s report is a great example of the benefits of a TUF fellowship to urologists at the beginning of their careers.

Read Dani's report

AUGUST 2024

We would like to congratulate Professor Aberra Gobezie on the award of two lifetime awards. One from Hawassa University and another from the Urology Society of Ethiopia (USE). Prof Gobezie was instrumental in the initial setup of the Hawassa University Comprehensive Surgical Hospital (HUCSH), and for forming the association with Shekhar Biyani. This has led to the long-standing association between HUCSH and Urolink, the development of a comprehensive urology team and improvement of urological training in the Southern Nations. Many congratulations Prof!

View images of the award cermonies

JULY 2024

Urolink is delighted to announce the winners of the 2024 round of TUF/Urolink fellowships. Ravi Banthia from Dundee, Brendon Berry and Johann Boaz from London, and Mike Ng from Plymouth have all been awarded this prestigious award. Each Fellowship, which is supported by the SAC, attracts a £1,500 bursary towards the cost of travel, and a period of time in a Urolink recognised centre. It is anticipated that the Fellows will, over the next 12 months, base their visits around Urolink-associated teaching/training events and workshops including in endo-urology, uro-gynae and reconstructive urology in sub-Saharan Africa. Congratulations to them all and many thanks to TUF for continuing to support this important experience stream for BAUS members.

Visit the TUF anouncement

JULY 2024

Read THET Chief Executive Ben Simms's blog about the value of NHS staff in the provision of global medicine, and THET's Health Partnership model. Ben says "In an Ipsos MORI poll commissioned by THET, 76% of NHS staff expressed a desire to share skills with their counterparts overseas. In this way, we can see how allowing busy NHS clinicians with busy day jobs to engage in global engagement is, counter intuitively, a way of retaining them in the NHS because the learning acquired globally motivates and informs their practice for the benefit of patients locally." This notion is totally in line with Urolink's ethos and is an interesting read, particularly at this time of political uncertainty as far as UK healthcare is concerned.

Read Ben's blog

JUNE 2024

Suzie Venn chaired the Urolink session at the BAUS Annual Scientific meeting in Birmingham. Dr Mumba Chalwe Kaja, Consultant Urological Surgeon, Ndola Teaching Hospital, Zambia and President of Women in Surgery Africa (WISA) presented a paper on 'Opportunities for advancing surgical practice in the global south - the WISA experience'. Wilson To presented Ala'a Sharaf's experience of the Meditech Urogynae Workshop in Malawi whilst Wilson  and Rory Ferguson gave their own papers about their TUF fellowship experiences at KCMC, Moshi, Tanzania. A video of part of the session is going to be made available at some point in the near future. Once it has been edited and uploaded it will be available by following the tabs to the Publications and presentations page and clicking on the BAUS meetings tab.

JUNE 2024

Urolink is delighted to announce the award of the John Anderson medal to Suzie Venn for her inspirational activity in teaching and training both in the UK and, in particular, in sub-Saharan Africa. Suzie has been BAUS Urolink chair since 2016 and has very strong links with the Kilimanjaro Christian Medical Center in Moshi, Tanzania, where she and her husband Richard are frequent visitors, and to Kamuzu Central Hospital in Lilongwe, Malawi. Suzie has been instrumental in the development of female urology in both of those countries as well as playing a pivotal part for mentoring programmes in paediatric urology, reconstruction and urolithiasis. Congratulations Suzie!

Read Suzie's award biography

MAY 2024

Read the reports of 3 of the 2023 TUF/Urolink Fellows visits to KCMC in Moshi, Tanzania. Wilson To (post CCT Fellow) experienced a complex trans-national reconstructive workshop there in November of last year, whilst Katie Brodie (ST7) and Rory Ferguson (ST4) were able to demonstrate the differential benefits of giving teaching experience outside of the UK at different stages in their UK urological training. Dani Whiting, the 4th 2023 Fellow, is going out to KCMC in a few months to help initiate the endourological Urolink collaborative project being funded by the BJUI over the next 3 years.

Read Wilson To's report  

Read Katie Brodie's report  

Read Rory Ferguson's report