THE Medical Association of Jamaica will confer its prestigious honour — the President’s Award — on veteran medical practitioner, Dr Ray Fraser later this week.

The award will be presented during the MAJ’s annual awards banquet next Saturday, June 7, at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel in St Andrew.

At the same time, the MAJ wil also recognise two other doctors who have rendered yeoman service to the medical profession, and, like Dr Fraser, also contributed to the MAJ. Dr RE Christopher Rose of the University Hospital of the West Indies (UHWI) and Dr Hopeton Falconer of the Mandeville General Hospital, will be so honoured with the MAJ Council Award at the banquet where Professor Peter Wing, Emeritus Clinical Professor, Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, University of British Columbia, Canada, will deliver the keynote address.

The banquet will be one of the highlights of the MAJ Week activities, which start today with a church service at the Stella Maris Catholic Church in St Andrew.

Manchester-born Dr Fraser was raised in the tough inner- city community of Jones Town, South St Andrew and attended Jones Town Primary and Kingston College. He went on to obtain his Bachelor of Science degree in Natural Sciences from the University of the West Indies and upon completion, he was awarded a scholarship to study medicine in Havana, Cuba, 30 years ago.

He did postgraduate studies at the Royal College of Surgeons in Edinburgh, Scotland and has been Senior Medical Officer (SMO) of the Annotto Bay Hospital for the last 18 years.

Before his appointment as SMO at Annotto Bay, Dr Fraser worked at the Mandeville General Hospital, the University Hospital of the West Indies, and the Kingston Public Hospital.

He also did short stints at the St Ann’s Bay Hospital, St Ann; Falmouth Hospital, Trelawny; and Princess Margaret Hospital in St Thomas.

Dr Fraser, a former president of the Kingston College Old Boys Association, also served as board chairman of the relatively new Annotto Bay High School.

He is a Consultant General & Laparoscopic Surgeon, Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons in Edinburgh and a Justice of the Peace.

Apart from his affiliation with the Medical Association of Jamaica, Dr Fraser is also a member of the Medical Council of Jamaica, the organisation which oversees the practice of medicine locally; a member of the Association of Surgeons of Jamaica, member of the Association of Government Consultants of Jamaica; Director of Winchester Surgical and Medical Institute, and member of the St Mary Health & Environmental Committee.

He was bestowed with the national honour, Order of Distinction (Commander Class) for his contribution to medicine in 2012.

“I am honoured to have been considered by the MAJ for this prestigious award,” the father of two sons and a daughter told the Jamaica Observer.

“I am indeed touched by the MAJ’s decision to honour me, as there are several other members of the medical profession who are worthy of this award and could have been chosen. I commend the people who have supported me over the years, especially at the Annotto Bay Hospital. My success is due to the effort of the team at the hospital,” Dr Fraser said.

Dr Rose is a consultant orthopaedic surgeon in private practice and honorary consultant in the Division of Orthopaedics, UHWI.

A native of Grenada, Dr Rose attended the Grenada Boys’ Secondary School and completed his undergraduate training at the University of the West Indies in 1975. He did orthopaedic training at the University of Ottawa, Ontario, Canada in 1983

and also completed a three-month fellowship in limb lengthening, limb reconstruction and deformity correction in Italy in 1996.

Dr Rose joined the Faculty of Medical Sciences at the UWI, Mona in 1984 as a consultant and lecturer in orthopaedics. He functioned as the sole consultant in orthopaedics for eight years, and was Head, Division of Orthopaedics from 1989 to 2010. He continues to provide consultancies to the UHWI since retirement in 2010. Dr Rose was responsible for the creation, implementation and development of the post-graduate Orthopaedic Training Programme at Mona, which was started in 1991 and at the end of 2013, had graduated 29 orthopaedic surgeons with all finding employment in the Caribbean.

Dr Rose pioneered limb lengthening and deformity correction (Ilizarov Method) in Jamaica. This method has been used successfully to treat approximately 1,000 patients from Jamaica and other Caribbean islands.

His community service extends to sports, looking after the orthopaedic needs of netballers, footballers, cricketers and athletes. He also served for many years as the vice-president and chairman of the Education Committee of the Jamaica Association of Sports Medicine.

Dr Falconer is a consultant physician at the Mandeville Regional Hospital (MRH) and associate lecturer in the Department of Medicine at the University of the West Indies, Mona.

A son of St Elizabeth, he attended Jamaica College before entering the University of the West Indies to study medicine. He graduated in 1974 with Honours in

Applied Pharmacology and Therapeutics, and later returned to pursue the DM in Medicine.

Dr Falconer was later awarded a fellowship by the Dutch Government and read for the Master of Science degree in Immunology at the University of Amsterdam. He returned to Jamaica in 1981 and has served as consultant physician at the Mandeville Hospital since.

Dr Falconer was responsible in the development of Internal Medicine services for Central Jamaica. Under his leadership, the MRH was accredited for internship rotations in medicine.

In 2008, Dr Falconer was appointed Senior Medical Officer at the Mandeville Regional on the retirement of Dr Peter Wellington.

He continues to serve the Mandeville community and sits on the boards of several schools and colleges in

the area.

The St Elizabeth Homecoming Foundation awarded him the Golden Thermometer Award for services to medicine; and the Government of Jamaica, as well as the MRH has also formally recognised his services to the hospital and the country.

Dr Falconer has membership with the Medical Association of Jamaica, the Caribbean Cardiac Society and is a board member of the Association of Consultant Physicians of Jamaica.

Among the other events for MAJ Week, which runs until Sunday, June 8, will be the opening of a symposium & MAJ house ceremony on Wednesday, June 4; followed by the symposium from Friday, June 6 to Sunday, June 8.

The theme of the symposium will be ‘The World of Medicine’, which is geared to update doctors on latest health issues. Included in the symposium will be a session on the ‘Business of Medicine’, as well as lectures, ethics workshops and displays by drug companies.