Neurosurgery Chair
Thomas Gennarelli, MD
Dr. Thomas Gennarelli, an internationally renowned clinician and researcher in the field of traumatic head injuries, was appointed professor and chairman of the Department of Neurosurgery at Froedtert and The Medical College of Wisconsin in 1999.
Previously, Dr. Gennarelli served as professor and chairman of the Department of Neurosurgery at Allegheny University of the Health Sciences in Philadelphia. He had been director of the Center for Neurosciences, director of the Pennsylvania Health Injury Center and neurosurgeon-in-chief at Allegheny University Hospitals.
Prior to that, he was vice-chairman of the Department of Neurosurgery at the University of Pennsylvania, where he directed one of the five NIH-funded head injury centers in the nation.
Board certified in neurological surgery and advanced trauma life support, Dr. Gennarelli serves as president of the International Neurotrauma Society, on the board of directors of the Coalition for American Trauma Care and is past president of the Association for the Advancement of Automotive Medicine. He is also a founding member of the International Neurotrauma Society, the International Society for Neuroemergencies and the Eastern Association for the Surgery of Trauma.
Dr. Gennarelli is listed in Woodward and White's "Best Doctors in America" and "Best Doctors in America Northeast Region," and was named one of the "Best Medical Specialists in North America" by Town and Country magazine.
Dr. Gennarelli is currently co-principal investigator for a study of the biomechanics of neural and neurovascular injury funded by the Center of Injury Control, U.S. Centers for Disease Control. Dr. Gennarelli is co-director of The Froedtert & The Medical College of Wisconsin CIREN Center, the tenth center of the Crash Injury Research and Engineering Network (CIREN) of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, US Department of Transportation. He has published 306 original research papers, written 41 book chapters and three editions of "The Abbreviated Injury Scale," the international standard for determining the severity of bodily injuries. He has served as an editorial advisor for a dozen peer-reviewed journals, a consultant or special advisor to 20 major injury prevention programs, and a visiting professor to 50 universities in the United States and abroad.
Among his honors are membership in Alpha Omega Alpha, the national medical honor society, and Alpha Sigma Nu, the national Jesuit honor society. Dr. Gennarelli has received the National Head Injury Foundation's 1984 Caveness Award for outstanding contribution to head injury, the Association of Advancement of Automotive Medicine's 1988 A.J. Mirkin Service Award, and its 1990 Award of Merit for contributions to brain injury research, and its 1991 award for best scientific paper.
Dr. Gennarelli received his medical degrees with honors from Loyola University Stritch School of Medicine in Chicago. He completed a residency in neurological surgery at Georgetown University Hospitals, a neurology fellowship at Harvard Medicine School and a surgery internship at Rush-Presbyterian-St. Luke's Medicine Center in Chicago.
In addition to his expertise in brain injury, Dr. Gennarelli has a clinical practice in which he specializes in surgical treatment of brain tumors, pituitary tumors, visual disorders, vascular diseases of the brain and facial pain. He is especially interested in minimally invasive surgery and skull base surgery.