Areas of Expertise

Professor Brian Saunders is a highly-experienced gastroenterologist and endoscopist who regularly performs a range of diagnostics, including:

• Colonoscopy
• Polypectomy
• Advanced tissue resection; Endoscopic mucosal resection (EMR) and endoscopic submucosal dissection (ESD)
• Gastroscopy
• Flexible sigmoidoscopy
• Capsule endoscopy

Some of the most common conditions he treats are:

• Bowel cancer screening and prevention
• Colonic polyps
• Inflammatory bowel disease
• Dyspepsia and gastrointestinal reflux
• Gastrointestinal bleeding

About Professor Brian Saunders

Professor Brian Saunders is a Consultant Gastroenterologist, Specialist Endoscopist and Partner at OneWelbeck; specialising in diagnostic and screening colonoscopy, and advanced polypectomy. He has performed more than 30,000 colonoscopies, is the Director of Bowel Cancer Screening for North West London; and has pioneered many of the major developments in colonoscopy in the last 20 years.

After qualifying from University College Hospital in 1988, he joined St Mark’s Hospital as a consultant in 1997. By 2003, he was appointed their head of endoscopy.

Part of the team who led the successful bid for St Mark’s to become a National Endoscopy Training Centre, he is now Director of the Kennedy-Leigh Academic Endoscopy Unit. Here, he supervises a team of research clinicians dedicated to improving the management of gastrointestinal diseases through the use of flexible endoscopes – pioneering procedures which can significantly improve cancer prevention and patient safety.

Professor Brian Saunders partnered with OneWelbeck in 2018 to collaboratively develop the OneWelbeck Digestive Health Centre. He used his extensive experience to help select the most modern equipment utilising the latest technology to enhance polyp detection and cancer prevention.

“I am passionate about quality assurance and there will be careful monitoring of key performance indicators for all the clinician users of the facility to ensure the highest standards of care, for every patient.”

Professor Saunders, MBBS, MD, FRCP, FRCS; qualified from University College Hospital in 1988 and was trained in general medicine and then gastroenterology and endoscopy, in London, Darlington and Melbourne, Australia. He achieved MRCP in 1991 (FRCP 2002) and was awarded an MD from the University of London in 1996 for his work into ‘making colonoscopy easier’. His MD thesis was based around the magnetic imaging system, which has now been adopted as standard practice in many endoscopy units throughout the world. This work formed the basis of his award of the Hopkin’s Endoscopy prize from the British Society of Gastroenterology, in 1996.  After his appointment as consultant physician and senior lecturer at St. Mark’s Hospital in 1997 he was promoted to Adjunct Professor of Endoscopy (Imperial College) in 2013 and Professor of Endoscopy Practice in 2018.

Professor Saunders joined OneWelbeck in 2018 for the opportunity to work closely with a group of outstanding colleagues and clinicians, and an ambitious management team dedicated to create a state-of-the-art facility for the delivery of care centred around flexible endoscopy. “This was a once in a life-time opportunity to be involved in something really special”.

Professor Saunders brings his unparalleled specialist experience and innovative approaches to colonoscopy, to the OneWelbeck team.

Research Highlights

Professor Saunders has authored or co-authored 160 scientific papers and written more than 15 book chapters. He is also the co-author of the highly renowned, Practical Gastrointestinal Endoscopy and has been guest editor of the North American Clinics of Gastrointestinal Endoscopy journal.

Awards & Recognition

Some of his ‘world firsts’ include: the development of electromagnetic scope imaging, use of mucosal dye to enhance polyp detection, use of electronic imaging to characterise colonic polyps in vivo and development of novel endoscopic devices and techniques to enhance safe endoscopic polyp/early cancer resection.

He has given lectures and live demonstrations of endoscopy at most of the major endoscopy and gastroenterology meetings throughout the world, including the British Society of Gastroenterology and the American College of Gastroenterology. From 2005–2009, he was Dean of the Academic Institute at St Mark’s Hospital. He has received the medal of honour from the Danish Society of Surgery in 2012 and 2015, gave the Bristish Society of Gastroenterology endoscopy foundation lectures in 2002 & 2015 and was awarded an FRCS by election from the Royal College of Surgeons in 2016.