Neurosurgery

Clinical Partners

• Tufts Medical Center
• St. Elizabeth's Medical Center
• Maine Medical Center
• Lowell General Hospital (in 2023)

Tufts Medical Center Neurosurgery Department Leadership

Department Interim Chair and Director, Neurosurgery Clerkship: Ron Riesenburger, MD
Residency Program Director, Julian Wu, MD  

Teaching  and Club Activities

TUSM AANS Student Interest Group

TUSM students interested in neurosurgery are encouraged to join the AANS (American Association of Neurological Surgeons) student interest group. With guidance from faculty co-advisors Ron Riesenburger MD and Marie Roguski MD, officers of this club schedule educational talks throughout the year. Topics of these talks vary and include research presentations, discussion of specific disease processes and treatments in neurosurgery, preparing for residency, and deciding on a career in neurosurgery. The Office of Student Affairs maintains a Club Leadership List which contains the contact information of the AANS student leaders.

Neurosurgery Department Teaching Conferences

TUSM students are welcome to attend the Neurosurgery Department teaching conferences. These conferences occur every Thursday morning and typically start at 7:30AM. Please email the President of the TUSM AANS student interest group to get specific information regarding the location of these conferences.

Neurosurgery Research

Students are welcome to join the neurosurgery attendings and residents in ongoing research projects within the department. Please see the research interests of each attending in Research section below.

Preclinical TUSM Neuroscience Course

Tufts Neurosurgeons give several of the formal lectures in this course. Neurosurgery Attendings also lead the small group seminars in which Classic Neurology Case Vignettes are reviewed.

TUSM Selective Program

TUSM students in the first and second year can elect to participate in a Neurosurgery Selective. Students on Selective rotations spend one afternoon a week for 6 weeks with one of the neurosurgeons in the department. The TUSM course catalog lists the available selectives.

Fourth Year Clerkships

There are two different 4th year rotations, listed as SNR401 and SNR 405 in the TUSM course catalog. SNR401 is the Neurosurgery Sub-internship for students strongly considering a career in neurosurgery. SNR401 is intended to give the student a thorough exposure to neurosurgery and typically includes 3-5 overnight calls per month. Sub-interns will receive reading material to prepare for Thursday morning conferences and are expected to participate in these conferences.

Dr. Riesenburger reserves mentorship time for each SNR401 student regardless of whether they are a TUSM or visiting sub-intern. Mentorship meetings include discussions about application strategies, the match process in neurosurgery, etc.

SNR405 is for students wishing to gain exposure to neurosurgery and do not intend to pursue neurosurgery as a career.

All students typically do a one week rotation on each of the following: vascular, tumor, spine, and consults/radiosurgery. Medical students on clinical rotations learn how to evaluate and treat patients with acute neurological conditions. They round with the neurosurgery inpatient team, perform consultations, and scrub in on surgical cases. They learn about the surgical treatment of patients with brain and spinal disorders.

Students are required to give a short presentation on a relevant neurosurgical topic on the last Thursday morning of the rotation. Please contact Dr. Riesenburger or his assistant at 617-636-8484 with any questions about medical student rotations.

We enjoy hosting visiting medical students from other medical schools around the country. Visiting students should call Dr. Riesenburger and/or email Kiara Matier and Ariel Thomas  to set up a neurosurgery sub-internship at Tufts.

Tufts Neurosurgery Residency

The Tufts Neurosurgery Residency is seven years including one year of research. The program accepts residents via the ERAS/NRMP Match. In addition to Tufts Medical Center, residents spend 6 months at Children’s Hospital Boston for their pediatric neurosurgery experience and 3 months at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital for a functional neurosurgery rotation. All aspects of clinical service and education are directly monitored by the neurosurgical faculty and local program directors at these three institutions but overall supervision is under the Tufts Medical Center Program Director.

The goal of our neurosurgery residency training program is to provide outstanding clinical training and surgical experience to the resident. The attending staff stresses both bedside and operating room teaching while encouraging progressive independence in clinical decisions and the performance of surgery. The abundance and variety of surgical procedures ensure that the finishing resident will be familiar with and competent in “state-of-the-art” neurosurgery. Participation in research and the acquisition of research skills is required. The attending and house staff encourage a close and collegial relationship.

Research Programs

Jason Frerich, MD

Dr. Jason Frerich's research is focused on clinical outcomes of spinal deformity and minimally invasive complex spine surgery, as well as broad issues related to population health. Specifically, his lab investigates physical activity and recovery following spine surgery, minimally invasive approaches to spinal deformity surgery, post-surgical spinal morphology, and artificial intelligence modelling of radiographic data to understand generators of spinal pain. In regard to public health, Dr. Frerich studies obesity as it relates to spinal disease, and more broadly, health disparities and access to care, medical ethics, behavioral economics applications in health care, and violence as a public health crisis.

James Kryzanski, MD

Dr. James Kryzanski has two research groups that involve TUSM students. The Spine Research Group is currently studying awake lumbar surgery and has published extensively on the Tufts Neurosurgical experience using spinal anesthesia. The Epilepsy Research Group is primarily interested in minimally invasive epilepsy surgery and epilepsy surgery outcomes.

Adel Malek, MD, PhD

Dr. Adel Malek conducts research at The Malek Cerebrovascular Research Laboratory which investigative efforts are concentrated in two related areas sharing as a common conceptual framework the important effect that external mechanical forces exert on cellular structure and function. Dr. Malek's computational cerebral hemodynamic studies evaluate the effect of blood flow on brain aneurysm formation and rupture. Dr. Malek strongly encourages students from TUSM to participate in these research efforts.

Ron Riesenburger, MD

Dr. Ron Riesenburger’s research investigates spinal amyloidosis and possible relationships with cardiac amyloidosis and carpal tunnel syndrome. He has co-authored manuscripts and book chapters with over 40 TUSM students and residents. Several TUSM students have received research awards and grants with his guidance. Under his mentorship, TUSM students won the prestigious Shucart Award for best medical student oral presentation at the New England Neurosurgical Society meeting in both 2015 and 2022.

Mina Safain, MD

Dr. Mina Safain’s research is focused on two major patient populations within Neurosurgery. First, Dr. Safain is interested in studying clinical outcomes after endoscopic endonasal resection of pituitary tumors. Utilizing an IRB approved database of pituitary tumor patients, Dr. Safain and his team study interventions that make these surgeries safer as well as improve patient outcomes after surgery. Secondly, Dr. Safain has a significant interest in minimally invasive spine surgery and outcomes associated with implementation of minimally invasive access to the spine. TUSM students are encouraged to email a CV to Dr. Safain if they are interested in this work or would like to hear more about it.

Julian Wu, MD

For over three decades, Dr. Julian Wu focused his neurosurgical practice and research in neuro-oncology. He has worked closely with many basic scientists to further our understanding of the mechanisms of brain tumor tumorigenesis, progression and invasion. Through novel clinical protocol studies, he has also worked collaboratively with clinical colleagues from different disciplines to develop better treatments for our brain tumor patients. He is involved in several active brain tumor multidisciplinary clinical protocols including protocols in immunotherapy, radiosurgery and Tumor Treating Field. He is the co-director of the Boston Gamma knife Center the only of its kind in Massachusetts. We use this technology to treat patients with both benign and malignant brain tumors. It is his mission to apply what we learned in the laboratory to the bedside and to improve treatments for our patients. As the director of the Tufts neurosurgery residency training program he is committed to the education of neurosurgery residents and future neurosurgeons. He is also dedicated to mentoring students and fellows from other disciplines in interdisciplinary research in the neurosciences.