Biography

Professor Veerasamy Yengopal was appointed Dean of the Faculty of Dentistry in October 2021, having previously served for many years as Head of Community Dentistry at the University of the Witwatersrand.

Prof Yengopal is no stranger to UWC - he earned his BChD in Dentistry from the University many years ago, and returned for his PhD in Dental Health / Community Dentistry 25 years later. (In between, he also earned his MChD in Community Dentistry from Stellenbosch University and his BSc Honours in Epidemiology from the University of Stellenbosch Business School.)

He is recognised among his peers as an academic with an outstanding publication record and excellent leadership skills. His areas of interest include child oral health, HIV/AIDS, evidence-based dentistry and dental epidemiology. He has published extensively and has presented at international conferences in most parts of the world, and established himself as an expert in evidence-based healthcare, systematic reviews and meta-analysis. 

He has worked with the National Oral Health Directorate and the Department of Health on strategy documents, teaching and research initiatives, outreach prevention programmes, quality assurance, patient satisfaction, evidence-based interventions, referral systems and CPD activities. He was also a key player in the drafting of the Revised National Oral Health Strategy Document for South Africa. 

His work is quoted extensively and serves as core evidence that informs on policy and evidence-based clinical decision making, and has been used as evidence to guide policy and treatment decisions by leading healthcare institutions such as the American Dental Association, National Health System (NHS – UK), the Cochrane Library, and the Forsythe Institute at Harvard.