Associate Professor De Villiers Smit

Associate Professor De Villiers Smit is Head, Emergency Medicine Program at the National Trauma Research Institute and holds other offices within the Alfred Health group including Program Director Emergency & Intensive Care, Director of the Emergency & Trauma Centre at The Alfred Hospital and Director of Emergency Services (which also includes the Sandringham Hospital Emergency Department).

Following graduation from medical school in South Africa, A/Prof Smit worked for a number of years in the UK and New Zealand before settling in Australia in 1999. He completed his training as emergency physician at The Royal Melbourne Hospital in 2001. Since then, he has worked at The Northern Hospital (Director of Research), Bendigo Hospital (Director of Emergency Medicine Training) and as Senior Lecturer in Emergency Medicine at The Chinese University of Hong Kong (2002-2003).

A/Prof Smit has worked in some of the largest Trauma Centres in South Africa, the UK, New Zealand, Hong Kong and Australia. He has also been involved in a number of capacity building projects in Sri Lanka, China, India and Vietnam. He is currently actively involved in the establishment of a Masters in Advanced Emergency and Trauma Care in collaboration with Monash University. In addition to an active interest in research and education, he is heavily involved with improving patient flow and safety within the Emergency Department setting.