He is the inaugural President of Asia Pacific Orthopaedic Association (APOA) Hand & Upper Limb Society (H&ULS), a society with membership from over 16 countries in the Asia Pacific region. The focus of the H&ULS is to promote teaching, research, service and fellowships to improve the standard of care in the Asia Pacific region. To achieve the aim, the Society has developed a 3-year comprehensive free webinar teaching program freely available to anyone. The webinar is a free broadcast with participation ranging from 500 to over 5000 participants. Prof Mah works collaboratively with hand, elbow and shoulder surgeons within the APOA member countries to enhance quality of health care, to develop teaching and research programs across many centers of excellence.
Prof Mah set up the APOA Young Ambassador programme in 2000. This has enabled younger surgeons within each APOA country to attend APOA Congresses, giving them a voice within the Association. Prof Mah also established many exchanges Travelling Fellowships between APOA, EFORT (European Federation of Orthopaedics & Traumatology), SICOT (Société Internationale de Chirurgie Orthopedique et de Traumatologie) and PAOA (Pan Arab Orthopaedic Association), promoting exchange of young surgeons globally.
Prof Mah founded the Clinical Hand & Upper Limb Fellowship program in Adelaide in 2001, which is accredited by the Australian Orthopaedic Association and Royal Australasian College of Surgeon. To this day, Prof Mah has trained many fellows from Australia, Sweden, Malaysia, India and NZ to name a few. Between 2001 and 2005 three qualified Malaysia surgeons furthered their training with Prof Mah. Upon successful completion of their training, they returned to their home country to offer their newly acquired skills to the community. As a result, the number of highly skilled surgeons in Hand and Microsurgery in Malaysia doubled immediately.
In 2014, Prof Mah instigated the APOA Younger Surgeons Subcommittee. The purpose is to develop their leadership qualities and to encourage the global exchange of ideas, knowledge and collaboration in research, teaching and service amongst younger orthopaedic surgeons across the world.
Prof Mah instituted an APOA Disaster subcommittee immediately after the Nepal earthquake in 2015. This effort pulled aids from India, Australia and Malaysia to support the relief effort in the aftermath. The subcommittee convened again directly after the Kumamoto earthquake in Japan in 2016. Instigated by the APOA Disaster committee, many APOA member countries were proactive in supplying essential medical and non-medical aids to Lebanon disaster (Beirut explosion) in 2020.
Prof Mah was credited for the successful promotion and implementation of Federation of APOA during his Presidential term of APOA (2014-2016), where he increased the membership from 15 countries (around 2500 members) to 26 countries (over 65,000 members). The immediate impact of such success is the globalisation of orthopaedic training and fellowships, where orthopaedic surgeons from any member country can take part in any national and international meetings and apply for exchange fellowship and fellowship training globally without borders.
In 2018 Prof Mah collaborated with four other international orthopaedic organisations to facilitate the formation of a global alliance of Orthopaedic surgeons called Alliance of International Organization of Orthopaedics and Traumatology (AIOT). AIOT consists of five international orthopaedic organisations: APOA, EFORT, SICOT, PAOA and SLAOT (Sociedad Latinoamericana De Ortopedia Y Traumatologia). The purpose of such an organisation is to focus on matters with global relevance, such as COVID-19 Management, Disaster responses and to promote good governance, gender and racial equality in orthopaedic training and service.
At the NATIONAL and STATE Level, Prof Mah has made significant contributions to Orthopaedic surgery. He served as a Board member for the Australian Orthopaedic Association (AOA) to promote gender and cultural diversity as well as to improve governance. He was probably the longest serving AOA (SA) state treasurer (19 years), where he managed the finance of the association with care and diligence. Prof Mah served as Director of Training for the Orthopaedic Outreach of the AOA in early 2000’s, facilitated and improved the teaching of Orthopaedics in Fuji, Solomon Islands and PNG.
Prof Mah remained on the Asia Pacific Committee of the AOA for over 20 years. Together with many colleagues such as John Bartlett AM, Graham Mercer and Daryl Teague, Prof Mah facilitated the formation of several exchange fellowships with Indian Orthopaedic Association (IOA), ASEAN orthopaedic Association (ASEAN OA), Korean Orthopaedic association (KOA) and Turkish Society of Orthopaedics and Traumatology (TOTBID); thus enabling important social, cultural and scientific exchanges and Fellowships between numerous countries.
