Professor Yirupaiahgari Viswanath

Professional statement

Professor Yirupaiahgari Viswanath is a highly revered consultant general, upper GI (gastrointestinal), laparoscopic and endoscopic surgeon with practice in Darlington, Stockton-on-Tees and Middlesbrough.

With over 30 years of experience, Professor Viswanath specialises in a range of gastrointestinal conditions, including hernias (inguinal hernia, sportsman’s hernia, incisional hernia), gallstones, inflammatory bowel disease, oesophago-gastic cancer and acid reflux disorders. He is also an expert in advanced laparoscopic surgery and endoscopy procedures, such as dilation, radical cancer resections and EMR placement of stents, and regularly carries out upper GI assessments to examine benign and malignant structures. In the UK, he is a pioneer in STRETTA Therapy, a minimally invasive endoscopic procedure for gastroesophageal reflux.

Alongside his NHS work at South Tees Hospitals, Professor Viswanath currently sees private patients at Woodlands Hospital, Nuffield Health Tees Hospital and Tees Valley Hospital.

Professor Viswanath originally qualified from Mysore Medical College in 1989 before relocating to the UK. He completed post-graduate training at the prestigious Northern Deanery in Tyne and Tees and accomplished higher advanced laparoscopic surgery training in Leeds. Professor Viswanath worked for three years at the renowned northern oesophagi-gastric cancer unit in Newcastle upon Tyne and, as an expert in upper gastro-intestinal pathologies, later led the successful centralisation of oesophago-gastric cancer services in Teesside, South Durham and North Yorkshire.

In 2001, Professor Viswanath took up his consultant post at James Cook Hospital, one of the largest tertiary centres in the UK, where he also served as the upper-gastrointestinal oncology team lead, the chairman of the clinical governance committee for surgery, as well as the cancer lead clinician, overseeing all major onco-specialties at the hospital. He is also a UK-wide trainer for symposia’s in endoscopic, laparoscopic and robotic surgery and programme director for postdoctoral MCh surgery specialties.

As a national leader in his specialty, Professor Viswanath’s excellent standards of practice have also been recognised with various accolades, including the distinguished National Clinical Excellence Award in 2011, 2015 and 2018, and the National HSJ Award. He is also recognised by his medical professional peers as well, with elected representative posts for laparoscopic surgery at the British Benign Upper GI Surgical Society and the Association of Laparoscopic Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland.