SPEAKER PROFILES:

DR ANGELA MCLIGEYO
Dr. Angela McLigeyo is a licensed Physician and Medical Oncologist practicing in Kenya. She has a Master of Medicine in Internal Medicine from the University of Nairobi, a M.Sc. in Clinical Oncology from Ulm University (Germany), and a Fellowship in Medical Oncology from the University of Nairobi. In addition, she obtained a 5-year board certification in Medical Oncology from ESMO in 2019. She has over 17 years of experiences in hospital and clinical settings.

She is a member of the Kenya Society of Hematology and Oncology (KESHO), European Society of Medical Oncology (ESMO) and American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO). She is also a fellow of the East, Central and Southern Africa College of Physicians.

Her core skills are in clinical decision making in internal medicine and oncology, conducting trainings, streamlining medical education and conducting research as well as participation in the development of treatment guidelines and protocols.

She currently provides comprehensive oncology healthcare at both public and private health facilities, conducts research in oncology and internal medicine when opportunities arise, and is engaged in teaching internal medicine and oncology at the Kenyatta University. She has authored several research articles in peer reviewed journals and presented abstracts at several conferences.

DR KARAN GANDHI
Dr. Gandhi graduated from The University of Nairobi to receive his medical degree in 2009 and did a year of internship at the Aga Khan University Hospital, Nairobi (AKUH,N) in 2010. He began his surgical training at the University of Nairobi in 2011 and then moved to the University of Cape Town in 2013. He qualified as a Fellow of the College of Surgeons of South Africa in 2018 and then went on to complete his subspecialist certificate training in Surgical Gastroenterology, specifically Hepato-Pancreatico-Biliary (HPB) Surgery, in 2020. He also received a Masters degree in Surgery (MMed) from the University of Cape Town in 2020. In the same year, Dr. Gandhi was also selected to represent Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) in the IHPBA 2020 International Fellows Retreat in Melbourne, Australia. His main clinical interests lie in Hepatic, Pancreatic and Biliary surgery, as well as gastrointestinal surgery, advanced endoscopy, ERCP and laparoscopy. Within the realm of HPB surgery, his primary focus has been on one of the most neglected diseases in the region, namely hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). In the Global Surgery 2030 document published by The Lancet Commission in 2015, eastern, western and central SSA were identified as the regions in the world with the greatest unmet needs in surgical care and in a strange coincidence, these are also the regions in SSA with the highest HCC incidence.

Dr. Gandhi has recently joined the AKUH,N as a full-time faculty member in the department of General Surgery, with a view to pioneering and developing HPB Surgery in Kenya, East Africa and SSA as a whole. He sees himself as one of a new generation of HPB surgeons that have a vision of changing the situation in SSA, where delivering a surgical service is hampered by a poorly managed and funded healthcare system, cost of treatment and a shortage of healthcare professionals. With the connections made during his training and the vision and guidance of his mentors, Dr. Gandhi looks forward to creating a network of young HPB surgeons to facilitate this important endeavour. He has helped set up and is currently involved in various multi-disciplinary team (MDT) meetings, including a monthly Sub-Saharan HCC meeting and an international collaborative HCC meeting with Fortis Hospitals in India. He is also actively involved with the HPB service and MDT meetings at the Kenyatta National Hospital, Kenya.

Dr. Gandhi is also passionate about teaching and training of young surgeons in Kenya, especially in the fields of laparoscopy and surgical endoscopy delivery in rural areas. He is a member of the Operating Theatre Practitioners Association of Kenya (OTPAK), where training workshops are organised for surgical trainees in the Kenyan College of Surgeons of East, Central and Southern Africa (COSECSA), in order to train and empower them to perform basic laparoscopic surgical procedures in rural centres. His role as a faculty member at the AKUH,N also includes supervision and training of surgical residents, thereby promoting academia alongside clinical service delivery. He plans to set up a surgical registry database in the hospital, which will be used to generate data, audit practice and produce high-quality research that can be published in reputable peer-reviewed journals.

DR CAROLINE TONIO (MODERATOR)
The moderator for this session is Dr Caroline Tonio. Dr Tonio is currently a Physician and Medical Oncologist at the Kenyatta University Teaching, Referral and Research Hospital in Kenya.