David Ofori-Adjei (born 15 April 1949) is a

Ghana Ghana (; tw, Gaana, ee, Gana), officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country in West Africa. It abuts the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean to the south, sharing borders with Ivory Coast in the west, Burkina Faso in the north, and To ...

ian physician, medical researcher, academic and medical journal editor. His main areas of research are clinical

pharmacology Pharmacology is a branch of medicine, biology and pharmaceutical sciences concerned with drug or medication action, where a drug may be defined as any artificial, natural, or endogenous (from within the body) molecule which exerts a biochemica ...

pharmacogenetics Pharmacogenomics is the study of the role of the genome in drug response. Its name ('' pharmaco-'' + ''genomics'') reflects its combining of pharmacology and genomics. Pharmacogenomics analyzes how the genetic makeup of an individual affects the ...

, infectious diseases such as

malaria Malaria is a mosquito-borne infectious disease that affects humans and other animals. Malaria causes symptoms that typically include fever, tiredness, vomiting, and headaches. In severe cases, it can cause jaundice, seizures, coma, or death. S ...

schistosomiasis Schistosomiasis, also known as snail fever, bilharzia, and Katayama fever, is a disease caused by parasitic flatworms called schistosomes. The urinary tract or the intestines may be infected. Symptoms include abdominal pain, diarrhea, bloody s ...

Buruli ulcer Buruli ulcer () is an infectious disease characterized by the development of painless open wounds. The disease is limited to certain areas of the world, most cases occurring in Sub-Saharan Africa and Australia. The first sign of infection is a s ...

, and

HIV/AIDS Human immunodeficiency virus infection and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) is a spectrum of conditions caused by infection with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), a retrovirus. Following initial infection an individual ...

and public sector pharmaceutical management. He is currently the Editor-in-Chief of the ''

Ghana Medical Journal The ''Ghana Medical Journal'' is a quarterly open-access peer-reviewed medical journal from Ghana. It is published by the Ghana Medical Association and the current editor-in-chief is David Ofori-Adjei. The journal is under the African Health Journ ...

''.

Background

After completing his secondary education at the

Mfantsipim School Mfantsipim is an all-boys boarding secondary school in Cape Coast, Ghana, established by the Methodist Church in 1876 to foster intellectual, moral, and spiritual growth on the then Gold Coast. Its founding name was Wesleyan High School and ...

, in

Cape Coast Cape Coast is a city, fishing port, and the capital of Cape Coast Metropolitan District and Central Region of Ghana. It is one of the country's most historic cities, a World Heritage Site, home to the Cape Coast Castle, with the Gulf of Guinea ...

, Ghana, he enrolled at the

University of Ghana The University of Ghana is a public university located in Accra, Ghana. It the oldest and largest of the thirteen Ghanaian national public universities. The university was founded in 1948 as the University College of the Gold Coast in the Br ...

Medical School in 1969 and graduated in 1975 with a

MBChB Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery ( la, Medicinae Baccalaureus, Baccalaureus Chirurgiae; abbreviated most commonly MBBS), is the primary medical degree awarded by medical schools in countries that follow the tradition of the United Kin ...

. He then completed his post-graduate training in Internal Medicine at

Korle Bu Teaching Hospital Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital (KBTH) is a public teaching hospital located in the Ablekuma South Metropolitan District in Accra, Ghana. It is the only public tertiary hospital in the southern part of the country. It is a teaching hospital affiliate ...

Accra Accra (; tw, Nkran; dag, Ankara; gaa, Ga or ''Gaga'') is the capital and largest city of Ghana, located on the southern coast at the Gulf of Guinea, which is part of the Atlantic Ocean. As of 2021 census, the Accra Metropolitan District, , ...

, and in Scotland. He became a Fellow of the

West African College of Physicians The West African College of Physicians is a professional society, founded in 1976, for medical specialists in the West African sub-region. The association promotes postgraduate specialist training, professional curriculum development and fellowsh ...

in 1983, a

Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh The Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh (RCPE) is a medical royal college in Scotland. It is one of three organisations that sets the specialty training standards for physicians in the United Kingdom. It was established by Royal charter ...

in 1994, a Fellow of the Ghana College of Physicians and a Fellow of the

Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences The Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences (GAAS) is a learned society for the arts and sciences based in Accra, Ghana. The institution was founded in November 1959 by Kwame Nkrumah with the aim to promote the pursuit, advancement and dissemination ...

, as well as a Member of

New York Academy of Sciences The New York Academy of Sciences (originally the Lyceum of Natural History) was founded in January 1817 as the Lyceum of Natural History. It is the fourth oldest scientific society in the United States. An independent, nonprofit organization wit ...

in 1997.

Career

In 1982, Ofori-Adjei joined the University of Ghana as a lecturer in medicine and therapeutics at the Department of Medicine and the Centre for Tropical Clinical Pharmacology. He was elected to the Council of the Division of Clinical Pharmacology of the International Union of Pharmacology and Clinical Pharmacology in 2000, serving until 2006. Ofori-Adjei has promoted the Rational Use of Drugs in Ghana and the development of a National Essential Drugs List with Therapeutic Guidelines in association with the Ministry of Health. He served on the United States Pharmacopoeia Convention and the International Health Advisory Panel for 10 years. Ofori-Adjei was the director of the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research in Ghana from 1 December 1998 until 30 September 2006. Ofori-Adjei is the Editor-in-Chief of the ''

''. He is one of three program directors at the African Journal Partnership Program (AJPP). Sponsored by the US

National Library of Medicine The United States National Library of Medicine (NLM), operated by the United States federal government, is the world's largest medical library. Located in Bethesda, Maryland, the NLM is an institute within the National Institutes of Health. Its ...

and the US

John E. Fogarty International Center The John E. Fogarty International Center was founded in 1968 by US President Lyndon Johnson at the National Institutes of Health to support international medical and behavioral research and to train international researchers. History On July 1, ...

, the AJPP with the assistance of leading European and US medical journals, such as Lancet and the New England Journal of Medicine, in mentoring African medical journals to improve their publications and their access online to international audiences. Ofori-Adjei is currently part of the membership committee of the

World Association of Medical Editors The World Association of Medical Editors (abbreviated WAME, pronounced "whammy") is an international, virtual organization of editors of medical journals. It was originally founded in 1995 by a group of members of the International Committee of Me ...

and has been a past director of the association, a global non-profit voluntary association of editors of peer-reviewed medical journals. He was appointed as a council member at the

Committee on Publication Ethics The Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) is a nonprofit organization whose stated mission is to define best practice in the ethics of scholarly publishing and to assist editors and publishers to achieve this. Mission COPE educates and su ...

with a term from 2017 to 2010; he is the only council member from Africa.

Sources

biography in ''The Lancet''

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ofori-Adjei, David Ghanaian pharmacologists 1949 births Living people University of Ghana alumni Alumni of the University of Edinburgh Ghanaian expatriates in the United Kingdom Fellows of the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences