Professor Michael Bailey is the father of modern laparoscopic surgery in Great Britain and Ireland. He established MATTU (Minimal Access Therapy Training Unit) in the Royal Surrey County Hospital, Guildford on the initiative of the Department of Health, United Kingdom to provide training to surgeons to the new techniques in order to offer safe surgery to the patients. My work with him for eight years helped me to move to a level, different than so many other surgeons working in the country. I was duly appreciated by my great teacher and trainer.

Professor Bailey, being a prodigy of famous British surgeon Norman Tanner, was a complete surgeon. Open and Laparoscopic surgery in the hands of this master craftsman and genius was truly poetry in motion; great pleasure to watch and learn from.

I was fortunate to learn many classic Tanner techniques from Professor Bailey, in hepatobiliary, common bile duct, oesophageal, Gastric and colorectal surgery. We incorporated these “Tanner’s techniques” and concepts in complex laparoscopic surgery procedures as well.

The exposure and experience in Laparoscopic Hernia surgery and Laparoscopic Anti Reflux surgery gave me an excellent head start. We taught and trained surgeons from all over the world in these techniques. In addition, we presented our work from Royal Surrey County hospital to NICE for hernia guidelines.

I learned patient respect, patient care, style, teaching at world stage and many other things from this great British surgeon.