Prof Julia Blitz

Julia Blitz became a Family Physician in 1989! Her practice over the next few decades spanned public and private practice
in both rural and urban areas, eventually landing in academia in 1997. She remained an academic Family Physician for the next twenty years, including international opportunities. About 10 years ago she moved into Health Professions Education,
subsequently being awarded a PhD on a topic that bridged Family Medicine and Medical Education. Her last full-time job
was as Vice-Dean: Learning and Teaching in the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences at Stellenbosch University. She
is now retired and balances looking after her grandson, with her ongoing involvement, through a number of institutions, in
undergraduate medical curriculum design and health professions education.

Prof Francois Venter

Professor WD Francois Venter, MD, FCP, PhD is Executive Director of Wits Ezintsha at the University of the Witwatersrand,
Johannesburg, where he received most of his training. His work involves health systems research and clinical trials, most
recently involving the antiretrovirals dolutegravir, tenofovir alafenamide, cabotegravir, and doravirine. He leads multiple
antiretroviral treatment optimisation studies and is currently working on new access programmes through private pharmacies within South Africa, patient linkage-to-care interventions, self-testing projects, as well as most recently on new large-scale primary care delivery platforms addressing hypertension, diabetes, obesity, hyperlipidaemia and HIV. He has led large PEPFAR-funded HIV programmes in South Africa, focusing on men, women, children, young people, truckers, sex
workers, and LGBTI communities. For over 20 years he has been an advisor to bodies such as the South African government, UNAIDS, and WHO, contributing to international, regional, and national HIV guidelines, and more recently WHO’s obesity guidelines. He has an active interest in medical ethics and has been involved in several human rights cases within the southern African region. He supervises post-grad students and has over 300 publications, including first-author articles in major journals.

Prof Lucille Blumberg

Professor Lucille Blumberg is an infectious diseases physician and medical microbiologist. She currently has honorary
appointments at the National Institute for Communicable Diseases, the Universities of Stellenbosch (Medical Microbiology) and University of Pretoria (Faculty of Veterinary Sciences), South Africa. Her focus is on outbreak prevention and response, emerging diseases, travel- related infections, the viral haemorrhagic fevers, malaria and zoonosis especially rabies. She is the current chair of the Strategic Advisory Group for Infectious Hazards for the WHO Emergencies Programme and a member a member of the scientific advisory group for the WHO Neglected Tropical Diseases programme. She is a longstanding member of the National Rabies Advisory Group in South and is the previous chair of the South African Malaria
Elimination Committee (SAMEC). Prof Blumberg has been involved in the prevention, detection and responses to a number of communicable disease outbreaks including cholera, typhoid, rabies, the Viral Haemorrhagic Fevers (Lujo, Rift Valley fever, Ebola), influenza (pandemic A H1N1, and Avian Influenza A H5N2) and diphtheria. Her special interests are in malaria, rabies, other zoonoses, East African Trypanosomiasis, travel and tropical medicine and border health issues. She has worked with Right to Care as a Technical Scientific Advisor since 2021.

Prof Nicholas Crisp

Prof Crisp is a medical doctor and public health specialist and Honorary Professor in Public Health Medicine at University of
Pretoria. He was Superintendent General (HOD) of the Department of Health and Welfare in Limpopo where he served from 1995 to 1999.  Prof Crisp was then a self-employed consultant and has worked on projects in several African countries including South Africa, Nigeria, Ghana, Lesotho, Botswana, Namibia and Tanzania. In 2009 he served as Special Adviser to Minister Barbara Hogan. He was intimately involved in the establishment of the National Health Laboratory Service (NHLS), the transfer of the medicolegal mortuaries from police to health and the creation of the Forensic Pathology Services, and in the establishment of the South African Health Products Regulatory Authority (SAHPRA). During COVID-19 he was responsible for managing the vaccination programme. He is now employed as Deputy Director General: National Health Insurance and is responsible for establishing the governance and administrative capabilities of the entity that will manage the Fund.

Prof Vanessa Burch

Vanessa Burch was Professor and Chair of Clinical Medicine at the University of Cape Town from 2008-2018. She is currently Honorary Professor of Medicine at UCT and works as an educational consultant to the Colleges of Medicine of South Africa. She has received numerous awards for Health Professions Education, serves on the editorial board of international medical education journals, and is the founding editor of the African Journal of Health Professions Education. She is widely published and is considered a leader in Health Professions Education in sub-Saharan Africa.

Professor Burch has received four national lifetime awards for teaching excellence: (1) Distinguished Teacher’s Award at the University of Cape Town; (2) National Excellence in Teaching and Learning jointly awarded by the Council for Higher Education (CHE) in the Department of Higher Education and Training and the Higher Education Learning and Teaching Association of Southern Africa (HELTASA); (3) Distinguished Educator (South African Association of Health Educationalists (SAAHE), and most recently, (4) a Teaching Advancement at University (TAU) fellowship, jointly awarded by the CHE and HELTASA. Vanessa Burch is also a Fellow of the Foundation for Advancement of International Medical Education and Research (FAIMER), founding Director of the sub-Saharan Africa FAIMER Regional Institute (SAFRI) and holds a Teaching at University (TAU) Fellowship from the Council for Higher Education of South Africa.

Her education research and education expertise include assessment of clinical competence, novel methods of teaching and assessment in the workplace, clinical reasoning, curriculum design and program evaluation.

Dr Madeleine Muller

Dr. Madeleine Muller is a Family Physician at Cecilia Makiwane Hospital in Mdantsane and a senior lecturer at Walter Sisulu
University. She provides clinical services and teaches and mentors medical students, registrars, and medical officers. Dr.
Muller graduated with a Master’s in Health Professional Education from Stellenbosch University in March 2025. Dr Muller is convenor for the CMSA Diploma in HIV Management and she serves on the National CMSA/SACOMD committee, responsible for rolling out workplace-based assessments in postgraduate medical education in SA.  Dr.Muller is part of the CMSA/SAAFP team rolling out the Supervisor Workplace Assessment and Teaching Training (SWAT) for clinical supervisors across the ten South African medical universities.  Dr Muller is on the steering committee for the South African Association of Health Educationalists Eastern Cape Chapter and is an executive committee member of the Rural Doctors Association of Southern Africa, where she oversees the mentoring portfolio and manages the Rural Onboarding program. She also serves on the executive board of the Professional Association of Transgender Health in South Africa.  With a strong passion for inclusive clinical care, sexual and gender health, and medical education, Dr Muller is dedicated to curriculum development and fostering the growth of emotionally competent, patient-centred clinicians.

Mikayla Van Welie

With a love of emergency medicine and critical care, Mikayla has spent many years both on the road and in the air as an Emergency Care Practitioner, fulfilling her goal of providing best practice to every patient. From being operational, she saw the need for best practice medicine to be taught and since, has obtained her Master’s degree in emergency medicine and has become a “Meducator”, specialising in the ability to teach various advanced life support courses and bringing simulation based learning into the teaching space.

Dr Tshegofatso Mabelane

Dr. Tshegofatso Mabelane is the first HPCSA certified Family Physician Allergist in South Africa and also an author of the
book, ” Basics of Allergy in Primary Care”. She obtained her subspecialist qualification in Allergology through the University
of Cape Town and College of Medicine South Africa. She also did the allergy exam with the European Academy of Allergy and Clinical Immunology under the European Union of Medical Specialists.  Dr. Mabelane serves as an Chairperson of the Diploma in Allergy for the College of Medicine South Africa. Her research in allergy led to the diagnosis of the 4th largest cohort in the world with red meat allergy.  We offer support and educational services on managing allergic disorders for primary clinicians in South Africa. Educational services are extended to patients and family members to empower self-management strategies.
The organisations conduct research as clinical trials in different fields of medicine but especially asthma, allergy, and other
immune diseases.

Prof Leon Snyman

Prof Klaus von Pressentin

Assoc Prof Klaus von Pressentin is an academic, primary care researcher, and clinician-educator based in Cape Town, South Africa. He is the head of the Division of Family Medicine and the deputy head of the Department of Family, Community and Emergency Care (FaCE) in the Faculty of Health Sciences of the University of Cape Town. His research focuses on primary care service strengthening (including chronic conditions and palliative care in primary care), human resources for health, and health professions education. He teaches primary care research methods, leadership development, clinical governance, evidence-based practice, and consultation skills. His current volunteer activities include serving as the Editor-in-Chief of the South African Family Practice Journal, serving on the Council of the College of Family Physicians of South Africa and chairing the Research Committee of the South African Academy of Family Physicians.

Dr James Porter

James Porter is a rural Family Physician trying to make it in the city. He is based at False Bay Hospital (Western Cape
Department of Health & Wellness) in Fish Hoek. He is also a senior lecturer in the Division of Family Medicine, Department of
Family, Community & Emergency Care, University of Cape Town. He chairs the SAAFP Point-of-Care Ultrasound Special
Interest Group

Prof Mergan Naidoo

MBChB, M.Fam.Med, FCFP, M.Sc (Sports Medicine), Dip HIV Man, DipPEC, PhD, PG Dip (HPE)  is an Associate Professor and Head:Clinical Unit in the Discipline of Family Medicine (FM) at UKZN and Wentworth Hospital (WWH). He coordinates the FM intern programme at WWH, the FM registrar programme at UKZN and a module for the Postgraduate Diploma in FM at UKZN. He is a practising clinician doing clinical work at WWH and supervising interns, medical officers and registrars. He is also involved in various clinical governance activities in the hospital.. His special interest includes infectious diseases, NCDs, maternal health and primary emergency care, and he has a keen interest in Health Professions Education, especially assessment and workplace-based training. He worked as a rural family physician in private practice and a sessional public sector doctor for 13 years earlier in his career. He has supervised Masters and PhD students and has published in various journals locally and internationally. He currently chairs the eThekwini Family Medicine forum, is the Honorary Secretary for the College of Family Physicians (CFP), and chairs the MCQ committee for the CFP. He is a member of the Education and Training Committee of the SAAFP and an active member of the Next5 Initiative and the SAAFP PhD interest group.

Dr Deidré Pretorius

Deidré Pretorius has been affiliated with Family Medicine and tertiary education for 22 years. At present she is the
coordinator of MMed (Family Medicine ) at Wits and serve on the Education and Training Committee of the SAAFP.
She serves on various committees for research and wellness at faculty level, provincial and national level. She is a
member of the International Sexual Medicine Network workgroup to promote sex education in medical schools
globally. In her free time, she is involved in charity projects around Pretoria. She also leads the sexual health section
for PHCFM. Deidré supervised 16 research projects to completion and is busy with another ten in various stages of
completion. She enjoys research and scientific writing and has an interest in sexual health, medical communication
and counseling, child abuse, domestic violence and social determinants of health

Dr Gail Ashford

Gail is a passionate clinician, who advocates for improved patient care and consultation skills. She is an HIV Clinician with
over 20 year’s experience in treating people living with HIV. She has a wealth of experience in caring for HIV positive pregnant
women through conception to breastfeeding. Gail is also interested in management of chronic conditions that include Diabetes, Obesity, Hypertension, Mental Health and Autoimmune conditions. Gail is a wife, mom of two humans, and dog mom too. She
loves to cook, run and read.

Dr Chantelle van der Bijl

Dr Chantelle is a recently qualified family physician working in Bloemfontein. After graduating, she identified the
need of newly qualified family physicians requiring mentoring and support in this transitional period in their careers. The
Next5 initiative of the SAAFP was born and has since 2022 it has provided newly qualified family physicians with a mentorship program as well as support through various initiatives.

Dr Arun Nair

Dr Arun Nair qualified as a Specialist Family Physician with a MMed FAM Med from the University of the Free State and FCFP (SA) from the College of Medicine of SA and is currently working full-time in the public health sector in Kimberley, South Africa. He is acting HOU and consultant specialist in the department of Family Medicine at Robert Mangaliso Sobukwe Hospital and an affiliate lecturer with the department of Family Medicine at the University of the Free State. He is an assistant editor for the South African Family Practice journal and a Next5 core member.