Staff and Training

The neurosurgical service for adults is based at Groote Schuur Hospital, Cape Town. The service is staffed by A/Prof Patrick Semple, A/Prof Allan Taylor, Dr David Welsh and Dr David Le Feuvre. The department maintains a 28-bed ward and 6-bed intensive care unit. Being a training institution for the University of Cape Town, neurosurgical registrars are based at the hospital, with two registrars rotating through the paediatric service at Red Cross Childrens Hospital. In addition to trainees from South Africa, the division has increasingly trained neurosurgeons from elsewhere in Africa.

Current Clinical Service

Apart from a busy practice managing a large volume of brain and spinal trauma cases, there are a number of subspeciality interests represented at the hospital, including: pituitary pathology, cerebrovascular disease, instrumented spinal surgery and spinal trauma, minimally invasive approaches, stereotactic and image-guided surgery. The service is complemented by an onsite MRI unit, multislice CT scanner and a modern angiographic suite for interventional cases.

A/Prof Semple is an authority on various pituitary pathologies, with an interest in endoscopy and spinal surgery. A/Prof Taylor has considerable experience with the surgical and interventional management of cerebral aneurysms and arteriovenous malformations; he is assisted in this by Dr Le Feuvre. Dr Welsh runs a busy spinal practice and jointly manages the acute spinal trauma unit based at the hospital. Average annual statistics for the department at Groote Schuur are as follows: 1500 admissions to the neurosurgical wards, approximately 850 operations.

Outpatient Services

Patients are seen at a number of clinics staffed by neurosurgeons with clinicians from radiotherapy, paediatrics, orthopaedics, urology, and plastic surgery. These include:

• General neurosurgical outpatients
• Combined pituitary clinic
• Brain tumour clinic