Cancer in Sub-Saharan Africa

Olufunso Adedeji is a consultant colorectal surgeon at the University Hospitals Birmingham and honorary senior clinical lecturer at the University of Birmingham, UK. He was first appointed as a consultant colorectal surgeon at City Hospital Sunderland, UK in 2001 before moving to University Hospitals Birmingham in July 2004. His main specialty is colorectal cancer. He is currently Chief Investigator for a project on geographical variation in epigenetics of colorectal cancer. The work is on-going at the Institute of Cancer and Genomic Medicine, University of Birmingham, and it is in collaboration with the Department of Anatomic and Molecular Pathology, College of Medicine, University of Lagos, Nigeria. He is currently supervising an MD research project.

Mr Adedeji has been a consultant colorectal and laparoscopic surgeon for over 15 years, and his specialty interests include bowel cancer and inflammatory bowel disease . He also has an interest in functional bowelproblems and pelvic floor problems. His special interest is in laparoscopic (key hole) surgery, which he uses regularly for major and complex colonic resections. Apart from colorectal problems, he also undertakes laparoscopic general surgical procedures like hernias. He is the organizer of the annual national Midlands Ano-Rectal UltraSonography (MARUS) course, which he started in 2004. He is a member of the Association of Coloproctology of Great Britain and Ireland.

Apart from his clinical work, Mr Adedeji is involved in education. He was formerly Programme Director for General Surgery in the West Midlands. He is currently deputy head of the undergraduate academy at the University Hospitals Birmingham, and he is responsible for the education of medical students posted to the hospital. He runs a two-day annual regional educational course, on teaching and learning, in collaboration with the University of Birmingham, for teaching fellows.

He is theEducation and Research Secretary for a UK based charity, the Ibadan Medical Specialists Group (IMSG). The group consist of alumni of the College of Medicine, University of Ibadan, Nigeria, based in the UK. Apart from its charitable work, the group promotes education and research, and they organise an annual symposium, trainees and medical students' presentations, and departmental seminars at the College of Medicine, University of Ibadan, Nigeria. Many of its members contributed to this book.