Our Founder

Professor Tony Redmond OBE

Founder of UK-Med

Professor Tony Redmond OBE is Emeritus Professor of Emergency Medicine at Keele University and Professor of International Emergency Medicine at the University of Manchester.

Tony is a registered specialist in emergency medicine with a special interest in the management of severe injury. He has been involved in international emergency humanitarian assistance for almost twenty five years, organising and leading medical support to natural disasters (e.g. earthquakes in Armenia, Iran, Pakistan, China, Indonesia, Haiti, Volcanic eruption and Cholera outbreak in Cape Verde) major incidents (e.g. Lockerbie Air Disaster, UN Air Crash Kosovo), conflicts(eg Bosnia, Kosovo, Sierra Leone) and complex emergencies (eg established tented hospital on Iran/Iraq border for Kurdish refugees) throughout the world.

UK-Med developed out of the South Manchester Accident Rescue Team (SMART). SMART started life as a local medical team, acting in support of the rescue and ambulance services in Manchester.

In 1988 Tony led a team of eight Manchester clinicians, including Brendan Ryan and Donald Mackechnie, when a huge earthquake ripped through Armenia. Tony continued to deploy teams throughout the 1990’s and 2000s, and registered UK-Med as a charity in 1995.

A step change occurred when Ebola struck West Africa in 2014. UK-Med recruited and trained the one hundred and fifty UK clinicians who worked alongside local medical teams, other NGOs and DfID to bring the outbreak under control. Tony become Chair of Trustees in January 2018, handing over to David Wightwick who was appointed as UK-Med CEO.

Read more about UK-Med’s history >