Along with the rest of the nation and the world, the University of Cape Town's Faculty of Health Sciences mourns the passing of our beloved Madiba. Read more ...

Results of a Faculty cancer research situational analysis were presented at a seminar of the Faculty of Health Sciences’ new Cancer Research Initiative on 27th November 2013. Director of Cancer Research Associate Professor Jennifer Moodley presented the outcome of a cancer researcher survey, an analysis of current cancer research projects, feedback from discussions with key internal and external role players and an analysis of recent research publications. Read more ...

Mymoena Abrahams* is a solitary figure in the front row of chairs at Groote Schuur Hospital's Smoking Cessation Clinic. Swathed in a black headscarf, she sits upright, gripping her handbag tightly. Abrahams started smoking at 17; and 40 years later, she says she's quitting. "It's bad for my health," says the 57-year old from the Cape Flats, where tobacco use among the coloured population is the highest in the country - and in the world. Read more ...

A new platform for Africans to tackle health on the continent will focus on generating creative and innovative solutions that cut across disciplines and sectors. The launch of the University of Cape Town’s Inclusive Healthcare Innovation Initiative (IHII), at a Summit on 29 & 30 January 2014, will see 250 international and local innovators, experts and influencers from business, health, government, sciences, engineering and other sectors discuss and debate what healthcare innovation means in, and for, an African context. Read more ...

27 November 2013, South Africa and Canada - In a new study published in PLOS One today, researchers and scientists from McGill University in Canada and the University of Cape Town in South Africa proved that an innovative, synergistic, tailored internet and paper based, oral fluid based HIV self-testing strategy can be safely operationalized for linkages. Read more ...

The 2013 reunion season kicked off last Friday when the MBChB Class of 1998 celebrated its 15th year since graduation from UCT with a cocktail party in the foyer of the IDM building. Other reunions taking place in the next few weeks are the 25th, 40th and 50th reunions. Read more ...

It is with sadness that I inform you of the passing of Emeritus Professor Peter Jacobs on Monday November 18th. He had been unwell for the past year, and passed away peacefully at home in the presence of his wife. Read more ...

The Dean recently hosted a delightful tea for over 40 ‘senior’ alumni – those who graduated more than 50 years ago – to introduce himself as well as share his vision for the Faculty. Held in the MAC Club the event turned out to be a very fruitful question and answer session. Read more ...

It was like negotiating peak hour traffic with a host of backseat drivers, someone quipped outside the cardiac catheterisation laboratory at the Red Cross Children’s War Memorial Hospital. Inside, a complex heart stenting procedure was being demonstrated and relayed to a lecture theatre full of paediatric cardiologists and registrars who were able to participate in the procedure, shown on a large screen, by asking questions and sharing observations. Read more ...

It's unlikely that Professor Trevor Sewell has ever been introduced as an architect, but in tracing the work outlined in his recent inaugural lecture, A Journey into Inner Space: A view of biology from the atomic perspective, architecture is a neat way of describing his work conceptually. Read more ...

UCT scientists featured prominently in the Medical Research Council's (MRC) recent merit award ceremony, with "the highest honour in medical research in the country" being conferred onto four high profile academics. Emeritus Professor Eric Bateman, director of the Lung Institute, received a lifetime achievement award in the form of the MRC’s platinum medal. Read more ...

The first randomised trial to measure the impact of the rapid Xpert MTB/RIF test for tuberculosis (TB) in a real-life clinical setting finds that it can be accurately performed by a non-specialist with minimal training, improves same-day diagnosis and time to starting treatment, and increases the number of people who start treatment after testing positive on day 1 by 50%, compared with conventional TB diagnostics. Watch video. Read more ...