Prof Finlay Macrae AO

Prof Finlay Macrae is Head of Colorectal Medicine and Genetics at The Royal Melbourne Hospital. 

He has public and private practices focusing on inflammatory bowel disease and familial bowel cancer. He draws on his mature clinical experience and active engagement in new advances in IBD to support his patients both in public and private.

Prof Macrae's engagement in research brings contemporary thinking to his patients and practice, including in the genetics of risk for bowel cancer, and new therapies for IBD. He trained in London with the world's leading colonoscopist  at the time (St Mark's Hospital), bringing this skill to Australia and his practice.

A natural leader, Prof Macrae has built his department to manage the interpretation of DNA variants responsible for inherited GI cancers to be the most authoritative in the world, whose opinions are sought globally. His clinical research  in cancer prevention covers early detection, and prevention (particularly with aspirin) through designing and implementing randomized controlled trials; he has fostered numerous commercially sponsored trials of new agents for IBD, providing access to those innovative therapies through the department's clinical trial portfolio.

In 2016, Prof Macrae was awarded an AO (Order of Australia) for his work in genetics and genomics. He is a Master of the  World Gastroenterology Organization, and Fellow of the American Gastroenterology Association and Royal College of Physicians.