Published: September 19, 2019

AAO-HNSF Joint Meeting: African Head and Neck Society 2019 Meeting

The 3rd Annual Conference of the African Head and Neck Society (AfHNS) took place in Harare, Zimbabwe, this past May. It was hosted by the Zimbabwe Society of Otolaryngologists. The conference theme was “Finding Solutions for Head and Neck Challenges”


By: Ryan Goepfert, MD
Department of Head and Neck Surgery
University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center

Joint Meeting Logo

The 3rd Annual Conference of the African Head and Neck Society (AfHNS) took place in Harare, Zimbabwe, this past May. It was hosted by the Zimbabwe Society of Otolaryngologists. The conference theme was “Finding Solutions for Head and Neck Challenges” and was led by current AfHNS President Paul Onkoya, MD, from Ibadan, Nigeria, and Zimbabwean hosts Innocent Kundiona, MD, and Cameline Nyamarebvu, MD. Otolaryngologists and head and neck surgeons from many African countries presented their research, including incoming President Anna Konney, MD, from Kumasi, Ghana, and President-elect Evelyne Diom, MD, from Dakar, Senegal.

Joint Meeting

The meeting included a neck dissection course for local trainees at Parirenyatwa Hospital, led by Kenneth Baidoo, MD, from Accra, Ghana; Joyce Aswani from Nairobi, Kenya; and Stuart Burrows from the United Kingdom as well as an ultrasound course for head and neck surgeons led by Merry Sebelik, MD, from the United States (Emory) and Tobias Todsen, MD, from Denmark. The AfHNS core members are comprised of the graduates from the two head and neck training programs in Africa, namely the University of Cape Town Karl Storz Fellowship led by Johannes Fagan, MD, and the Pan African Academy of Christian Surgeons (PAACS)/Johns Hopkins Fellowship in Cameroon lead by Wayne Koch, MD. The 4th Annual Conference will take place in Dakar, Senegal, December 17-19, 2020. For more information, please visit afhns.org.


More from October 2019 – Vol. 38, No. 9