From the moment the heart of brain-dead Denise Darvall started to beat in the chest of Louis Washkansky in an operating theatre in Groote Schuur hospital in Cape Town in 1967, South Africa staked a claim to world-class expertise in cardiology.
Dr Christiaan Barnard was to become a household name around the world. Now, 44 years later, another Groote Schuur specialist, Professor Bongani Mayosi, is establishing a name in the world of cardiology.
Mayosi, is the chief specialist at Groote Schuur and head of the department of medicine in the faculty of health science at the University of Cape Town.
He is also the president of the College of Physicians in South Africa, the immediate past president of the South African Heart Association and the vice-president of the Pan African Society of Cardiology.
Born in Mthatha in the Eastern Cape, Mayosi graduated with his first degree in medicine from the University of KwaZulu-Natal in 1990. He gained clinical experience, first as an intern and medical officer at Livingstone hospital in Port Elizabeth before being appointed senior house officer and registrar in medicine and cardiology at University of Cape Town affiliated hospitals.
In 1998, Mayosi was awarded an honour that has been bestowed on only a handful of South African medical doctors: an Oxford Nuffield Medical Fellowship at the University of Oxford.
Over the next three years, he studied cardiovascular genetics under the tutelage of one of the world’s most renowned clinical cardiologist and laboratory scientists, Professor Hugh Watkins.
Mayosi gained his DPhil in 2003, with a doctoral thesis based on the “genetic determination of cardiovascular risk factors in families”.
Returning to South Africa in 2001, he joined the University of Cape Town and Groote Schuur hospital, where he worked as a researcher, lecturer and clinician in internal medicine and cardiology.
During this time his academic work focused on researching an area that was getting little attention from academics around the world: the heart disease that affects the poor: cardiomyopathy, tuberculous pericarditis and rheumatic fever.
Always employing the widest range of investigative approaches, from molecular to clinical to population-based methods, his efforts to improve the understanding and control of these health problems were considered unique.
In addition, he was at the forefront of efforts to close the “know-do” gap with respect to heart disease of the poor, encouraging policymakers to increase investment in evidence-based control programmes.
By 2006 Mayosi had been appointed professor and head of the department of medicine at the University of Cape Town and chief physician at Groote Schuur hospital in Cape Town.
Over the years he has been awarded many honours and accolades, including an ad hominem associate professorship in October 2003, election to the Fellowship of the European Society of Cardiology in 2004, the Fellowship of the American College of Cardiology in 2005, and the Fellowship of the Royal College of Physicians of London in 2006. He is a regular keynote speaker at medical congresses and conventions around the world and has been published widely on topics related to cardiovascular medicine.
In 2005 he was awarded the National Research Foundation President’s Award and elected to the Membership of the Academy of Science of South Africa in recognition of his achievements.
Then, in 2009 President Jacob Zuma conferred upon him the highest honour that South Africa can bestow upon any citizen: the Order of Mapungubwe in Silver, for his contribution to medical science.
Professor Bongani Mayosi will be a guest on Bonitas House Call on June 18 on SABC2 at 9am
This article originally appeared in the Mail & Guardian newspaper as a sponsored feature