FRIENDS OF THE ROYAL COLLEGE OF SURGEONS IN IRELAND, INC. (formerly The Colles-Graves Foundation) is an independent US not-for-profit corporation. Friends of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, Inc., (the Friends) support and advance research and education in medicine and related fields, in the programmes of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI), and other advanced educational institutions in Ireland, the United States and globally.
The Friends can accept donations by check or credit card as well as appreciated stock, matching gifts, and planned gifts.
Making a Gift
Making a gift online
Make a gift via check and post
Please download and complete the Donation Form (PDF, 175KB) and send your gift via post to -
- Dr Helen Towers
-
Friends of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, Inc.
277 West End Avenue, 4C
New York
NY 10023
Stock/Shares, Matching Gifts and Planned Gifts
To make a gift of this kind, please contact us directly via email friendsofrcsi@rcsi.ie
Tax Efficient Giving
The Friends is a publicly supported charity, exempt from Federal taxation under Internal Revenue Code Section 501(c) (3). Contributions to the Friends are fully tax-deductible for those who pay USA taxes. You will receive a US tax receipt signed by the Treasurer of the Friends.
Acknowledgement
You can advise the Friends where you would like your gift to be directed. The Board of Trustees has complete discretion over the distribution of gifts and will consider your wishes when making grants. The Friends will indicate to RCSI that your gift has made a grant possible.
Thank you for supporting Friends of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, Inc.
Board of Trustees
Dr Clare Tempany-Afdhal
Trustee
Dr Clare Tempany-Afdhal graduated from RCSI in 1981. She then completed the Federated Hospital’s Dublin SHO two year program and left Ireland to do a residency in Diagnostic Radiology at Loyola University of Chicago and fellowship in Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore MD. In 1991 she was appointed to the faculty at Harvard Medical School and staff in the department of Radiology at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital Boston. She has remained there ever since and is currently the Ferenc Jolesz MD Professor of Radiology, Harvard Medical School (HMS), Vice Chair of Radiology Research, and Medical Director of the Advanced Multi-Modality Image Guided Operating (AMIGO) suite at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH). A diagnostic radiologist with expertise in prostate cancer, her research lab is dedicated to MR imaging for detection, diagnosis, staging, treatment, monitoring of prostate cancer, and image guided interventions. Her research on Prostate MR, image-guided interventions and the challenges related to engineering these interventions, has been continuously funded by NIH for over 20 years.
Dr Michael Brennan
President and Trustee
Dr Michael D Brennan, a native of Ireland is a 1969 graduate of RCSI. Following internship in Dublin he completed a residency in Medicine at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. Upon completion of a fellowship in Endocrinology he was appointed to Mayo consultant staff. He is a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland and the American College of Endocrinology and is Professor of Medicine (Emeritus) of the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine. He served on national committees including as a Director of the American Thyroid Associations. Mayo Clinic leadership roles included the President and CEO Leadership Council, Vice Chair Department of Medicine with responsibility for clinical practice and coordination and as Medical Director of the Program in Professionalism and Values. Awards include and the 1975 Travel Grant for Outstanding Medical Resident and 2001 Mayo Clinic Distinguished Clinician Award. In 2010 he was elected President of the Staff of the Mayo Clinic. He maintains close ties to RCSI and served two terms on the RCSI Advisory Board and was Chair of the Strategic Plan Review Panel. He is a proud recipient of an Honorary Fellowship of RCSI.
Dr James Dooner
Trustee
Dr Dooner was born in the United States but spent much of his early life, including secondary school, in Ireland. He attended the University of Rochester in New York earning a Bachelor's Degree in Neuroscience with distinction. He graduated from RCSI in 1991. He returned to the US for his ophthalmology training including residency and Retina Fellowship at the University of Alabama in Birmingham. He also completed a retina research fellowship at Johns Hopkins University. For the past 20 years he has lived in Austin Texas where he is in private retina surgery practice. In addition to managing patients with retinal diseases he also is actively involved in clinical research. He is the principal investigator for several nationally-recognized clinical trials involving novel medical and surgical treatment for retinal diseases. He is on faculty at Dell Medical School's Department of Ophthalmology. Dr Dooner is the past president of the Austin Ophthalmology Society. He is a member of the American Society of Retina Specialists, Texas Ophthalmology Association in the American Academy of Ophthalmology. He has been selected as one of Austin's Super Doctors consistently for over the past 10 years. This annual award is only given to the top 5% of ophthalmologists.
Dr Siobhán Gogan
Trustee
Dr Siobhán Gogan graduated from RCSI in 1983. For the past 28 years she has been a comprehensive Ophthalmologist in Southern California with Kaiser Permanente, a large HMO whose goal is to deliver quality medicine at an affordable price with an emphasis of preventative care. In the three years she has become more involved in the administrative running of this group.
Mr Michael Horgan
President Emeritus and Trustee
Mr Michael Horgan worked in RCSI for over 33 years: starting as Administrative Assistant in 1976, and appointed Chief Executive in 2003. Mr Horgan holds a BSc in Computer Science, and an MA from the University of Dublin (Trinity College) and a Masters in Industrial Engineering from UCD. He is a Chartered Director. He was awarded a number of honorary degrees, including a DSc from the University of Massachusetts, a PhD from Revans University (The University of Action Learning), and an Honorary Fellowship of RCSI. He chairs the Fintech/Global Payments company TransferMate and is a non-executive director of Intuition Ltd and a number of other commercial and charity boards. He was previously a board member of the Rotunda Hospital, of Beaumont Hospital and a member of the Senate of the National University of Ireland.
Dr Stephen Kee
Trustee
Dr Stephen Kee is Professor of Radiology and Chief of Interventional Radiology at UCLA Medical Center. He received his medical degree from RCSI in 1986 and performed his General Medicine and Radiology residency at Beaumont Hospital, Dublin. He then completed a Thoracic Imaging Fellowship at University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) followed by an Interventional Radiology Fellowship at Stanford University. Following this he practiced as an Assistant and then Associate Professor of Radiology from 1996-2006. In March 2006 he took over the role of Chief of Interventional Radiology at UCLA, and in 2008 became Professor of Radiology. Dr Kee is an active member of the Society of Interventional Radiology and is the Past Chair of the SIR Foundation. He has been Principal Investigator on a number of National and International trials, and has published extensively on Oncologic Interventions.
Professor Cathal Kelly
Trustee ex officio
Professor Cathal Kelly took up the position of Vice Chancellor and CEO/Registrar of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland in 2009. A Graduate and Fellow of RCSI, Professor Kelly previously held the post of Dean of the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences from 2006 to 2009. Prior to his appointment, Professor Cathal Kelly was a Consultant General and Vascular Surgeon, with a special interest in endovascular surgery, in Beaumont Hospital. In 2005, Professor Kelly was awarded a Postgraduate Diploma in Medical Education at Queen’s University Belfast. In 2009 he was conferred with a Master of Business Administration Degree by Institutio de Empressa of Madrid.
Dr Helen Towers
Secretary-Treasurer and Trustee
Dr Helen Towers graduated from RCSI in 1983. She has been a Board member of Friends of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, Inc. since 1995. She pursued postgraduate training in Ireland and subsequently moved to New York City where she completed pediatric residency and Fellowship training in Neonatal Perinatal Medicine. She has been on the faculty of Columbia University since 1995 and is currently Associate Professor of Pediatrics at Columbia University Medical Center and Associate Medical Director of the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital of New York.
Contact Us
- Dr Helen Towers
-
Friends of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, Inc.
277 West End Avenue, 4C
New York
NY 10023
- Aíne Gibbons
- Assistant Secretary-Treasurer
- friendsofrcsi@rcsi.ie
- Phone
- +353 1 402 2729