Dear Staff and Student Colleagues

So much of what the Faculty accomplishes is only possible through the strong leadership and vision of our departmental leaders, who provide a depth of knowledge and experience from their fields. One such leader is Professor Jeannette Parkes, who served as Head of Department: Radiation Medicine from February 2020 to December 2023, and whose tenure has now concluded. I am deeply grateful for her leadership during a time of great challenge for all.

Some of the highlights of Professor Parkes’ tenure include navigating her team through the Covid-19 pandemic where Radiation Medicine staff ran a medical ward, and continued to image patients as well as treat all new cancer patients referred.

Furthermore, Oncology installed two new linear accelerators, including a state-of-the-art machine with radiosurgery capability, a new computed tomography (CT) scanner and a new brachytherapy machine with associated theatre upgrades and pre-operative anaesthetic area re-design.

Impressively, Professor Parkes was nominated as a finalist in the Mail & Guardian Power of Women Awards (Healing Woman category) for 2023 and was selected as one of the International Society of Paediatric Oncology (SIOP) women leaders in Oncology for 2023. Professor Parkes returns to her role as Full Professor and Head of Division: Radiation Oncology. I wish her well.

I wish to welcome Professor Sulaiman Moosa as the interim Head of Radiation Medicine which began on 1 January 2024. He is a general radiologist whose research and teaching interest is Cardiac Magnetic Resonance imaging and focuses on training specialists in this modality, as well as participating in local and international workshops and congresses.

He is highly involved in imaging service delivery improvements projects at Groote Schuur Hospital and pursues ways to improve patient access to cross-sectional imaging, especially in under-resourced environments.

I look forward to working together with Professor Moosa as we move Radiation Medicine forward into its next chapter.

Kaise ke gangans
Associate Professor Lionel Green-Thompson
Dean: Faculty of Health Sciences