Pakistan honours UK kidney stone surgery pioneer Dr Shabi Ahmed with Tamgha-i-Imtiaz

LONDON: Leading British-Pakistani consultant urologist Dr Muhammad Shabi Ahmed, credited as one of the pioneers of a minimally invasive kidney stone removal procedure in the United Kingdom, has been awarded Pakistan’s Medal of Excellence (Tamgha-i-Imtiaz) for outstanding public services in the UK and Pakistan spanning nearly three decades.

The award was conferred on Dr Ahmed by President Asif Ali Zardari as part of Pakistan’s national civil awards, with the official Presidency record confirming him among the recipients of the Tamgha-i-Imtiaz.

Dr Ahmed is a Consultant Urologist in Birmingham, UK, and a Professor of Urology. He serves as a Visiting/Honorary Professor at Dow University of Health Sciences and the Sindh Institute of Urology and Transplantation (SIUT).

He has held senior professional positions, including Trustee and Vice President/Treasurer of the British Association of Urological Surgeons (BAUS), becoming the first Pakistani graduate to serve on the BAUS Council in its 80-year history. He is also a founder member of the Association of Pakistani Physicians in the UK.

A graduate of Dow Medical College in Pakistan, Dr Ahmed completed his higher surgical training in urology in Newcastle, with a particular focus on endourology and stone disease. He subsequently undertook advanced endourological training and fellowships in the UK and at high-volume specialist centres in Southeast Asia.

Dr Ahmed made his name in the UK as part of a small group of specialists who pioneered a minimally invasive procedure for removing kidney stones. The technique enables surgeons to remove a kidney stone of around 2cm through an incision of approximately 1cm, making the procedure less invasive and allowing patients to be discharged within 24 hours, compared with hospital stays of up to five days associated with earlier procedures.

Speaking about the procedure, Dr Ahmed said: “This new procedure involves using a thin telescopic instrument called a nephroscope. A small incision is made in the patient’s side and the nephroscope is passed through and into the kidney. The stone is either pulled out or broken into smaller pieces using a laser or pneumatic energy.

Dr Ahmed has also been extensively involved in charitable healthcare initiatives across Pakistan and other developing countries. He serves as a trustee and UK representative of SIUT and as a UK representative of the Indus Health Network. He is also associated with Midland Health in the UK, which established a charitable hospital in Muzaffarabad, Azad Jammu and Kashmir. In 2018, Dr Ahmed helped establish urology services at the Muzaffarabad hospital and has continued to support the programme.

He has also organised and participated in charitable urology camps in southern Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and rural Sindh.

His contribution to Pakistan also extends to medical education and postgraduate training. Dr Ahmed serves as an examiner for the College of Physicians and Surgeons Pakistan (CPSP) and as an examiner for the Master of Surgery (MS) programme in Urology. He also serves in an advisory capacity on medical training programmes nationally and internationally.

Dr Ahmed thanked the state of Pakistan for recognising and honouring his services.

He said: “I have been honoured by the Government of Pakistan with the prestigious national award of Tamgha-i-Imtiaz. This award means a lot to me, especially because it has been awarded to me by the country where I was born and which made me into what I am today. This award recognises my work with national and international charitable organisations, supporting healthcare delivery and fundraising for disadvantaged communities in the developing world, and my role in helping the health sectors in both the UK and Pakistan.”

At the height of the Covid pandemic, Dr Ahmed made headlines in the UK when he appeared on national television and raised concerns that doctors from minority ethnic backgrounds were being disproportionately affected by shortages of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE).

Channel 4 News research subsequently showed that doctors from ethnic minority backgrounds were more likely to be reprimanded when they raised concerns about the issue and that Muslim medics, in particular, were more likely to face discrimination. Dr Ahmed was the first doctor in the country to appear on national media to raise concerns over inadequate PPE provision.

He has also raised concerns over what he describes as the disproportionate treatment of ethnic minority doctors by the General Medical Council (GMC) and has advocated for doctors in distress, including highlighting these concerns in an interview with the BBC.C.