Profiles of Programs

The Department of Neurosurgery is continually involved in basic science and clinical research projects to investigate the causes, mechanisms, and treatment of a number of neurological diseases. The goal of these projects is to develop new insights into disease mechanisms, which can be used to create effective new treatments and to test the efficacy and safety of these novel treatments in clinic. This usually involves multidisciplinary collaboration among basic research laboratories and multiple clinical subspecialties.

• Alzheimer's Disease
  
  
• Brain Research
  
  
• Brain Tumor
  
  
• Functional Neurosurgery
  
  
• Radiosurgery
  
  
• Spine and Peripheral Nerve
  
  
• Stroke
  
  
• Surgical Navigation

Stanford neurosurgery faculties are currently engaged in a number of clinical research projects, including:

• New radiosurgical techniques to treat patients with brain metastases, skull
  base meningiomas and acoustic neuromas in order to preserve hearing;
  
  
• A pallidotomy trial for movement disorders, including Parkinson's Disease and juvenile dystonia, that maps the patient's anatomy to accurately target the surgical site;
  
  
• New techniques of intratumoral irradiation; clinical trials using NMDA receptor
  antagonists and other neuroprotective agents in head injury patients;
  
  
• Multi-modality therapy that utilizes embolization, microsurgery and stereotactic
  radiosurgery for complex intracranial vascular malformations;
  
  
• Evaluating surgical and non-surgical treatments for infants with
  craniosynostosis;
  
  
• Improved methods of evaluating and treating patients with medically intractable
  epilepsy;
  
  
• A molecular-genetic study that isolates the locus associated with familial central nervous system vascular malformations;
  
  
• Evaluating the outcomes of cervical fusion instrumentation;
  
  
• A multi-center study of patients with unruptured intracranial aneurysms; and
  
  
• Neurotransplantation to treat stroke.

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