Dr. Rirhandzu Ndzhukule is a Principal Investigator (PI) at the Desmond Tutu Health Foundation in Cape Town, South Africa. She earned her medical degree from the University of KwaZulu-Natal in 2004 and began her career during the peak of the HIV epidemic in South Africa. This pivotal time, coinciding with the government's launch of the HIV treatment programme, ignited her passion for HIV medicine. Dr. Ndzhukule later completed a Diploma in HIV Management and spent over thirteen years in clinical practice, focusing on the care of people living with HIV. She played a key role in establishing HIV clinics in the rural Mpumalanga province. She served as a mentor to registered nurses during the rollout of the Nurse Initiated Management of Anti-Retroviral Therapy (NIMART) programme.
Over the past seven years, Dr. Ndzhukule has transitioned into clinical research, beginning as an investigator in an HIV vaccine trial. Her research interests include HIV prevention and STI studies. Notably, she was a PI in a clinical trial that demonstrated no HIV infections among participants who received the six-month injectable PrEP. Currently, she is leading an STI prevention clinical trial as the PI.
