CNIS senior Essential Surgical Skills (ESS) and Structured Operative Obstetrics (SOO) instructors
Robin Fairfull-Smith
Dr. Robin Fairfull-Smith is a general surgeon at the Ottawa General Hospital and was the director for their residency-training program for more than 10 years. He has been volunteering with CNIS since 2006, teaching ESS instructor courses and doing surgical service in Tanzania twice a year for the past 6 years. He is the co-author of CNIS course Surgical Skills for African Residents.
Mark Hardy
Dr. Mark Hardy is a surgical oncologist, residing in Montreal, Quebec. He has taught ESS with CNIS in Tanzania.
Gwen Hollaar
Dr. Gwen Hollaar graduated from medical school at the University of Alberta, completed her general surgery residency at the University of Calgary and her Masters in Public Health at Johns Hopkins University. She returned to the University Calgary, where she has been on faculty since 1999. She has an active interest in international health development and is currently working in the area of medical education in Laos with the University of Calgary and in various countries in Africa with CNIS.
Ronald Lett
Founder of the Canadian Network for International Surgery (CNIS), Dr. Ronald Lett did his undergraduate medical training and post-graduate surgical training at the University of Alberta. He completed his Masters in Injury Epidemiology at McGill University. In 1996, Dr. Lett co-founded theInjury Control Centre – Uganda, the first lead-agency for injury control in sub-Saharan Africa and the Injury Prevention Initiative for Africa (IPIFA), a 10-country network. He is currently the International Director of the CNIS, residing in Ethiopia. Dr. Lett is co-chair of the African Canadian Committee for Essential Surgical Skills (ACC-ESS), Scientific Associate of the Injury Control Centre-Uganda (ICC-U) and ICC-Tanzania, honorary member of the IPIFA steering Committee and Adjunct Professor of Surgery at McGill University and at the University of British Columbia.
Tarek Razek
Dr. Tarek Razek is the Director of the Trauma Program at McGill University Health Centre. He has volunteered with CNIS for many years on various projects in Ethiopia and Tanzania, teaching Essential Surgical Skills (ESS™) courses, working on the infrastructure of Injury Control Centers and database projects. Dr Razek has been instrumental in popularizing the Trauma Team Training Course (TTT™) course in Eastern Europe and the Middle East. He has mobilized the Global Surgery Office at McGill to support TTT in Tanzania and Rwanda. , which he has taught on several occasions. He is the Chair of CNIS Board. Besides CNIS, he has volunteered for the International Red Cross, working as a war surgeon with the RCIC in Sudan with the Federation of the Red Cross and Crescent, as well as in Haiti.
Robert Taylor
Dr. Taylor is a Clinical Associate Professor in the Department of Surgery, University of British Columbia. He has been involved in surgical service and training in a dozen countries and helped CNIS establish the Essential Surgical Skills (ESS) course at two centres in Malawi. He is currently developing new surgical curriculum material for CNIS. Dr. Taylor was appointed to the Order of Canada in December 2010 for his contribution to improving medical services and surgical care in the world’s underserved populations.
Lorraine Woolford
Dr. Woolford received her Master of Science from McMaster University in Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics and became a fellow of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada Obstetrics and Gynecology in 1981. She has taught CNIS Structured Operative Obstetrics courses in Uganda and Rwanda on several occasions and brought the courses to Ethiopia in April, 2011. Lorraine is currently developing and editing the obstetrical material for CNIS.