Dr. Leonard Odum Ojorgu

MBBS (Sydney), FRACS (Paediatric Surgery)

Leonard Odum Ojorgu, a Catholic Priest, was born in the early ‘70s in Agwagune, Biase Local Government Area of Cross River State. He did his primary and secondary schools in Akamkpa between 1978 and 1992 at St. John’s primary school and Government Secondary School respectively. Between 1994 and 2004, he studied Philosophy and Theology at St. Joseph Major Seminary, Ikot Ekpene, Akwa Ibom State, an affiliate of Urban University, Rome, and graduated with honours in Philosophy and Sacred Sciences, respectively. In 2008, he obtained a Masters degree in Social Communication from the University of Calabar, the former of which leveraged him to secure a lecturing job in the University of Calabar. In the course of his scholarly journey in the University of Calabar, he developed a strong affection for antroposemiotics, an aspect of academic discipline that deals with human communication. Consequently, in 2013, he enrolled for Doctoral studies in human communication with “use of nonverbal communication in the enhancement of the physico-psychological health of the aged persons in Biase Local Government Area” as the topic of his dissertation, which he defended in 2017 and was, therefore, awarded a Doctorate degree in communication, in 2018. One major outcome of Ojorgu’s work is that, it has provided insights into how to employ an integral nonverbal communication therapy approach in the care of the aged in clinical and geriatric medicine through what he calls the PAB model of nonverbal communication therapy trajectory, summarized as follows: P =Paralanguage, A=Active Listening, B=Body Language This, no doubt, has advanced the scope of scholarship in the field of human communication and geriatrics. .