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24 February 2022 | Story Leonie Bolleurs | Photo Supplied
New Paed Profs
Three senior consultants in the Department of Paediatrics and Child Health were recently promoted to associated professor. From the left are Profs Jan du Plessis, Ute Hallbauer, and David Griessel.

“Dedicated, consistent hard work, a high standard of work ethics, specialised patient care, and high-quality research outputs.” These were the words used by the Head of the Department of Paediatrics and Child Health at the University of the Free State (UFS), Dr Lizzy Tabane, to describe three of its senior consultants who were recently promoted to associate professor.

The three academics who are making a difference in the lives of hundreds of people on a daily basis, are Profs Ute Hallbauer, David Griessel, and Jan du Plessis.

Drug-resistant tuberculosis and diabetics

Prof Hallbauer, the first female professor in the department, works as a consultant senior paediatrician in the Pelonomi and Universitas hospitals. She has proven herself to be a champion in rendering a comprehensive service in paediatric infectious diseases, including paediatric tuberculosis and the specialised area of paediatric drug-resistant tuberculosis (TB).

According to Dr Tabane, when Prof Hallbauer started working with children with drug-resistant tuberculosis in the province in 2006, she reached a success rate of more than 95% compliance and cure of this disease.

It was good to reap the benefits of improved diagnostics and treatment for this disease, says Prof Hallbauer, who initially did not like the topic of TB. “Once my knowledge improved and I diagnosed and managed some difficult situations, it was amazing to see what there is to learn and how much one can do to help children affected by TB. It is worrying that the disease is still so prevalent among children in South Africa,” she says.

Prof Hallbauer also renders a comprehensive service in paediatric diabetes in the Free State and assists doctors from the Northern Cape with advice. Her work includes contributing to the training of dietetics students, where she focuses on food choices for children with diabetes.

“Children with diabetes have taught me a lot of patience. I have learnt to individualise my approach to each child/parent and to never give up and to teach, re-teach and re-teach. Working with the Department of Dietetics and Nutrition to run a Kids Diabetes Camp every year has been a wonderful experience which has benefited everyone: the children, the students, the teachers,” says Prof Hallbauer.

Developmental paediatrics and autism spectrum conditions

Prof Griessel is currently one of two neurodevelopmental paediatricians in the Free State and Northern Cape area and is playing a key role in raising awareness about autism and autism spectrum disorders, both at national and international level. This led to him being elected as a member of the National Executive Committee of Autism South Africa and the Global Senior Leader Committee representing South Africa at the leading world society for autism research, namely the International Society for Autism Research. He was also one of the founders of the Autism Support Centre at the UFS and recently played a significant role in opening the School for Autism just outside Bloemfontein.

He is a firm believer in the critical importance of early child development to thrive in life. The work he is doing has embedded autism in the broader context of child development and is based on recent work in the basic sciences on childhood brain development.

“I am humbled to have interacted with so many autistic adults, young people, children, and families living with autism, who taught me about the real strengths of diversity and demonstrated the courage to persist in the face of adversity,” says Prof Griessel, who finds pleasure in interaction with children and young adults with autism. “Their emotions and feelings come from a pure place and motivate me to continue to be of service,” he says.

Paediatric oncology and paediatric haematology

One of the youngest paediatricians to be promoted to associate professor in the department is Prof Du Plessis, who has proven himself to be a champion in rendering a comprehensive and multidisciplinary service in the field of paediatric oncology and paediatric haematology, with a particular focus on palliative care.

“I always wanted to work with children and their families, and the holistic approach enticed me. It is a privilege to walk the cancer journey with these children and their families, from diagnosis to sometimes the end of life and thereafter.”

“Children are amazing, they have so much joy and unconditional love, and the oncology children are in a completely different league. Where else would you find children calling you their ‘pappa’ or a 15-year-old black girl telling the whole school ‘I have a white father’. It is such a privilege,” he says.

Prof Du Plessis, who was also rated the best lecturer by the medical students in 2020, says besides his fondness for working with children and their families, he unexpectedly fell in love with student teaching. “It is a huge responsibility, but so rewarding to play a small role in shaping the minds of tomorrow’s doctors. It is amazing to witness them experiencing the light-bulb moments and rekindle a passion for the occupation by just spending time with them and being an example of what it looks and feels like to enjoy your work.”

News Archive

DF Malherbe Memorial Lecture
2005-05-19

DF Malherbe Memorial Lecture: Language and language activism in a time of transformation (summary)
Proff Hennie van Coller and Jaap Steyn

Language activism necessary for multilingualism
The awareness is growing that language activism will be needed to bring about a truly democratic multi-lingual society. What is quite clear is that a firm resolve must continuously resist the concentrated pressure on Afrikaans-medium schools (and universities) to allow themselves to be anglicised through becoming first parallel medium, then dual medium, and finally English medium institutions.

Proff Hennie van Coller and Jaap Steyn said this last night (Wednesday night) in the 24th DF Malherbe Memorial Lecture at the University of the Free State. Prof van Coller is head of the Department Afrikaans, Dutch, German and French at the UFS. Both are widely honoured for their contributions to Afrikaans and the promotion of Afrikaans.

They discussed three periods of transformation since 1902, and said about the current phase, which started in 1994:  “Besides all institutions and councils having to be representative of South Africa’s racial composition, places of education were required to open their doors. Quite rapidly this policy has had the result that schools and universities may be solely English medium, but not solely Afrikaans medium. Afrikaans medium institutions — if they claim the right to remain Afrikaans — are quickly branded racist, even though their student body may include all races.

“Education departments are presently exerting great pressure on Afrikaans medium schools to become double or parallel medium schools.  Parallel medium education is an equitable solution provided it can be sustained. Established parallel medium schools, such as Grey College in Bloemfontein, have catered even-handedly for English and Afrikaans speakers for decades. But the situation is different in the parallel medium (and still worse in the double medium) schools that spring up usually at the behest of a department of education.

“Afrikaans schools are converted almost over-night into parallel or dual medium schools without any additional personnel being provided. Depending on the social environment, a parallel medium school becomes reconstituted as a dual medium school on average in five to eight years, and dual medium school becomes an English-only school in two to three years. Some Afrikaans medium schools have become English medium in just three years.

“Though the Constitution recognises mono-lingual schools, officials in the provinces insist that Afrikaans schools become dual or parallel medium; English medium schools are left undisturbed. One must conclude that the tacit aim of the state is English as the sole official language, despite the lip-service paid to multi-lingualism, and the optimistic references to post-apartheid South Africa as a ‘rainbow’ nation.”

They said a recent study has shown that the 1 396 Afrikaans schools in the six provinces in 1993 have dwindled to 844. The fall off in the Free State is from 153 to 97; in the Western Cape from 759 to 564; in Gauteng from 274 to 155; in Mapumalanga from 90 to 3; in the North West from 82 to 13; and in Limpopo Province from 38 to 12.

They said the changes at universities, too, have been severe, as university staffs well know. Ten years ago there were five Afrikaans universities. Today there are none. The government demanded that all universities be open to all, which has meant that all universities have had to become English medium. And no additional funding was forthcoming for the changes. The government policy amounts to a language “tax” imposed on the Afrikaans community for using Afrikaans.

“Only when all schools (and universities) are English will the clamor cease. Academics and educationists are beginning to speak openly of forming pressure groups to save Afrikaans schools, and of using litigation as one of their methods. 59% of Afrikaans parents have said they would support strong action if Afrikaans were no longer a medium of instruction at schools.”

 

 


 

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