Brian Rayner is an emeritus Professor and Senior Scholar of the University of Cape Town (UCT). He is past Head of the Division of Nephrology and Hypertension at the Groote Schuur Hospital and UCT and established the Kidney and Hypertension Research Unit in 2016. He is a past President of the Southern African Hypertension Society, and is an executive member of the African Regional Advisory Group of the International Society of Hypertension. He graduated M.B.Ch.B. from UCT in 1978, and FCP in 1986, and has a MMed and PhD from UCT. His doctoral thesis studied salt sensitivity and salt sensitive hypertension in indigenous South African people. He received the World Hypertension League Award for Notable Achievement in Hypertension in 2014 in his work related to his doctorate.

The Division of Nephrology and Hypertension and the Kidney and Hypertension Research Unit is an active training and research centre training Nephrologists from Sub-Saharan Africa, and has active Masters and Doctoral programmes. In 2016 the International Society of Nephrology endorsed the Division as a Regional Training Centre of Excellence.

Brian Rayner’s active research interests are therapy of hypertension, mutations in the ENaC, genetic determinants of salt sensitivity, primary aldosteronism, assessing adherence in hypertensive patients, physiological treatment of resistant hypertension and genetics of severe hypertension in blacks. Together with Profs Seedat and Veriava wrote the 2014 South African Hypertension Practice Guideline.

He has 147 publications in peer-reviewed journals. has made over 120 presentations at local and international congresses and has written 6 chapters in books. He was a principal investigator in the Altitude, Coral, Award 7, Accelerate, Duration 8, Reprise, Carmelina, Tecos, Signify, Fidelio, Figaro, Delight, Protect2, ASCEND-ND, and many other major international research studies.