Dr Ravishankar K Diddapur

Dr Ravishankar K Diddapur is a general surgeon practising at Gleneagles Hospital and Mount Elizabeth Novena Hospital, Singapore. He specialises in single incision laparoscopic surgery (SILS), and liver and transplant surgery.

Dr Ravishankar has been extensively trained in the United Kingdom in the fields of laparoscopic and hepatobiliary surgeries, and in multi-organ transplant (specifically, transplants of the liver, kidney, pancreas and small bowel). He completed his specialist training in general surgery in the UK, with subspecialty interest in transplant. He subsequently obtained his fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons with transplant as a subspecialty, and his Hesperis Diploma in transplantation from the European College of Transplantation. Dr Ravishankar has been featured on BBC Radio to speak about transplants.

Dr Ravishankar performs all variations of abdominal surgeries laparoscopically both in elective and emergency settings. In 2009, Dr Ravishankar performed the first single incision scarless laparoscopic appendicectomy in Southeast Asia. Dr Ravishankar continues to offer this unique surgery, both in acute and elective settings, for conditions such as acute appendicitis, hernia repair, gallstone disease, liver resection, liver cyst surgery, right hemicolectomy, left hemicolectomy, sigmoid colectomy and subtotal colectomy for various conditions including tumours, pancreatic resections, small bowel obstruction, small bowel adhesiolysis and small bowel resection, among others.

Dr Ravishankar was awarded his medical degree in 1986, ranking third in the university in his final exams, with distinctions in many subjects. During this time, he achieved awards and prizes in extra-curricular activities, some of which he represented nationally. He was awarded the first prize by Warwick University for his work on research and obtained his Masters in Surgery from Bombay University before moving to UK for higher training. Dr Ravishankar received the Health Manpower Development Program (HMDP) award from the Ministry of Health of Singapore, which allowed him to further his expertise in right lobe living donor liver transplant.

Dr Ravishankar was appointed Associate Consultant of Liver Transplant and Hepatobiliary Surgery at the Singapore National University Hospital (NUH) in 2003. At the same time, he held the position of Senior Clinical Lecturer at NUH. Shortly after, Dr Ravishankar was promoted to Consultant in the same specialty, and introduced laparoscopic surgery for major hepatobiliary surgeries to NUH.

Dr Ravishankar performed Singapore’s first laparoscopic liver resection and minimally invasive pancreatic necrosectomy. He set up and established laparoscopic hepatobiliary surgery at NUH, which has today become a renowned independent division at the hospital. During his consultancy at NUH, Dr Ravishankar performed complex liver transplants and paediatric liver transplants in patients with portal vein thrombosis and hepato-pulmonary syndrome. He performed all living donor hepatectomies for liver transplants and maintained a nil 30-day surgical mortality for all his elective surgeries at NUH.