Clinical Associate Professor Stewart Flemming

Stewart Flemming is a hand surgeon working at Fiona Stanley and Fremantle Hospitals.  His background, and original training, was in plastic surgery, but towards the end of his training he developed a deep interest in hand surgery and was awarded the British Society of Surgery of the Hand's Pulvertaft hand surgery fellowship.  He spent 6 months working with Professor John Stanley, one of the UK’s leading expert on arthroscopy and surgery of the wrist.  Thereafter he studied under Harold Kleinert at the internationally renowned Louisville Hand surgery service, Kentucky, USA, where many of the UK’s and Australia’s leading hand surgeons have been trained.  On return to the UK he helped to develop the hand surgery service at St Andrew’s Billericay, which was to become one of the largest and busiest centres in the UK. 

He migrated to Perth in 2008, following his heart, and worked at the Fremantle hospital and health service.  He married Barbara in 2009.  He established a weekly hand trauma service (one day a week) to reduce the workload on RPH.  When the Fiona Stanley Hospital was opened the service lapsed but its reinstatement was recommended, as part of the Plastic Surgery review of South Metro and, together with Mr Paul Jarrett, he set up a combined plastic / orthopaedic hand trauma day surgery service at Fremantle, unique in WA and one of only a few in Australia.

He has a special interest in Non Technical skills and teaches on the RACS NOn Technical Skills for Surgeons (NOTSS) courses, for senior trainees and consultants, and on the RACS Training in Professional Skills (TIPS) courses for trainees.  He is a Clinical Associate Professor in the Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences at UWA and teaches on the “Cutting Edge” courses at CTEC, where he has also established a microsurgical training course for nurses.  He has published more than 30 articles in peer reviewed journals and book chapters, and has made over 100 presentations to learned societies in Europe, USA and Australia.  He is undertaking research into “Communicating in the Operating Room” and “Fatigue in Surgeons” with Professor Sharon Parker of UWA’s Business School.  In his spare time he walks his dogs, paints, and dances Tango and modern jive with his wife.