Prof. Rajen Naidoo is an occupational health physician who served as Director of the IHU and was previously heading the Occupational Health Programme of the Department of Community Health. Prof. Naidoo received his occupational health training at the University of Cape Town in 1994. He subsequently received a Masters in Public Health (1998) and a doctorate (2002) - both in occupational medicine, from the University of Michigan (USA). His research interests are occupational and environmental respiratory diseases and dose response models. In 2005, when occupational medicine was finally recognised as a specialist medical qualification, Prof. Naidoo was one of the first to be accepted as a specialist by the Health Professional Council of South Africa. In 2005, he was promoted to Associate Professor in Occupational Medicine. Prof Naidoo was appointed Chief Specialist and Head of Department in April 2008. With the restructuring taking place in 2012, the DOEH became a Discipline within the School of Nursing and Public Health and Professor Naidoo became the Head of Discipline.

occupational health