Sanchia Goonewardene qualified from Birmingham Medical School with Honours in Clinical Science and a BMedSc Degree in Medical Genetics and Molecular Medicine. She has a specific interest in academia during her spare time, with over 727 publications to her name with 2 papers as a number 1 most cited in fields (Biomedical Library), and has significantly contributed to the Urological Academic World - she has since added a section to the European Association of Urology Congress on Prostate Cancer Survivorship and Supportive Care and is an associate member of an EAU guidelines panel on Chronic Pelvic Pain. She has been the UK lead in an EAU led study on Salvage Prostatectomy. She has also contributed to the BURST IDENTIFY study as a collaborator.
Her background with research entails an MPhil, the work from which went on to be drawn up as a document for PCUK then, NICE endorsed. She gained funding from the Wellcome Trust for her Research Elective. She is an Alumni of the Urology Foundation, who sponsored a trip to USANZ trainee week, and has published several books.
She has supervised her first thesis with Kings College London and Guys Hospital, and is an Associate Editor with the Journal of Robotic Surgery, responsible as Urology Section Editor. She is an Editorial board member of the World Journal of Urology and was a Guest Editor for a Special Issue on Salvage Therapy in Prostate Cancer. She is a review board member for BMJ case reports. Additionally, she is on The International Continence Society Panel on Pelvic Floor Dysfunction, Good Urodynamic Practice Panel, is an ICS abstract reviewer and has been an EPoster Chair at ICS. More recently she has been an ICS Ambassador 2020 and is an ICS Mentor. She has chaired semi-live surgery at ERUS and presented her work as part of the Young Academic Urology Section at ERUS. More recently she has been an ICS Ambassador 2020 and is an ICS Mentor. She has chaired semi-live surgery at ERUS and presented her work as part of the Young Academic Urology Section at ERUS.
Professor Raj Persad, appointed in 1996, is a Consultant Urological Surgeon and Andrologist in Bristol. In his clinical role, he is one of the most experienced pelvic cancer surgeons in the UK and was one of the first in the UK to practice female neobladder reconstruction following cystectomy for invasive bladder cancer. He has subspecialised over many years in precise surgical techniques which improve both oncologic and functional outcomes. This includes techniques ranging from 1) the use of the Da Vinci Robot for performing Robot Assisted Laparoscopic Radical Prostatectomy, 2) High Intensity Focused Ultrasound for minimally invasive non-surgical treatment of prostate cancer and 3) Rectal Spacer and Fiducial Marker precision placement for optimizing the outcomes of Image Guided Radiotherapy for prostate cancer.
In the field of Diagnostics he has been one of the National Leads in developing the prostate pre-biopsy MRI pathway for patients with elevated PSA. This has optimized the accuracy of cancer diagnosis minimized clinical risk and sepsis associated with transrectal biopsy. He has developed to a fine art both cognitive transperineal biopsies of the prostate as well as Fusion Biopsy of the prostate.
Professor Persad has been a National pioneer in minimally invasive techniques for the treatment of Symptomatic Benign Prostatic as an alternative to Transurethral Prostatectomy (TURP). These techniques include Urolift (prostatic urethral lift) procedure which he does under general or local anaesthetic depending on patient preference as well as REZUM, steam treatment of the prostate. He also treats BPH with Green Light Laser. All these techniques are offered by Professor Persad for BPH as well as traditional TURP if tablet therapy has failed or cannot be tolerated by the patient.
Professor Persad is also a National Authority in thetreatment of Erectile Dysfunction. He practices optimum medical therapies for all male patients and has a large cohort of patients who are diabetic or who have had prostatectomy and in need of erectile function restoration. If conservative therapy fails with erectogenic pharmacotherapy or use of medical devices he can offer the insertion of state of the art penile prosthetic devices. Professor Persad also treats deformity due to Peyronies across a range of severity, offering therapeutic injection in its early phases and various types of surgical correction if this fails according to patient needs.
Professor Persad has a 25 year experience in the restoration of fertility through microsurgical reversal of vasectomy and has some of the best results nationally. He also for more complex cases offers epididymo-vasovasostomy. In combination with the Bristol Centre for Reproductive Medicine, he will soon be offering male infertility procedures such as micro-TESE (testicular extraction of sperm
