Dr. Rainer Gruessner: Prestigious Education and Credentials

Dr. Rainer Gruessner is an expert in the field transplantation surgery. He is the former Chairman of the Department of Surgery, Chief of the Division of Transplantation and Director of Hepatopancreaticobiliary Surgery and currently serves as a Professor of Surgery and Immunology at the University of Arizona. Although he has spent most of his career practicing within the United States of America, he received his education in the country of Germany. Rainer Gruessner obtained his medical degree and his medical thesis (“summa cum laude”) from the Johannes Gutenberg University School of Medicine in Mainz, Germany, in 1983. He obtained his professorial thesis (“Habilitation”) from the Philipps University in Marburg, Germany, in 1991. Rainer Gruessner did his residency at the Johannes Gutenberg University before completing a 2-year fellowship in transplantation surgery at the University of Minnesota. He also received additional clinical training in vascular and general surgery at Philipps University in Germany, and in living donor liver transplantation at Kyoto University in Japan. He is a member of the most prestigious surgical societies and has published over 600 manuscripts, abstracts and book chapters. He is the editor of 2 standard textbooks on transplant surgery. He is widely regarded as one of the most innovative surgeons practicing today and his been credited with performing a number of firsts in the field.

Dr Rainer Gruessner

Dr. Rainer Gruessner is the former Chairman of the Department of Surgery at the University of Arizona. He held the position from 2007 to the current year of 2014 and was largely responsible for the complete rebuilding of the surgical department including the implementation of three new divisions along with numerous clinical programs. He also recruited over 60 new faculty members in order to significantly increase the operating room case volume. Dr. Rainer Gruessner introduced robotic and minimally invasive procedures throughout all Department of Surgery subspecialties allowing the Division of Cardiothoracic Surgery to become one of the largest robotic surgery programs of its kind in the nation.

Dr. Rainer Gruessner: A Preeminent Pancreas and Liver Surgeon

When it comes to medical experts, Dr. Rainer Gruessner is at the top of his field when it comes to transplantation and general surgery of the pancreas and liver. He is viewed as a progressive leader in these fields and has been recognized with developing pioneering techniques. He was the first to develop a standardized technique for living donor intestinal transplants; he was the first to perform a preemptive living donor liver transplant for oxalosis in a child; he was the first to perform a laparoscopic living donor distal pancreatectomy and nephrectomy; and he performed the first robot assisted total pancreatectomy with islet autotransplant in 2012. He was also involved in the first split pancreas transplant in 1988.

Dr. Rainer Gruessner’s contributions to his fields don’t end there. His findings and technical innovations are all documented in the scientific literature. He has edited two standard textbooks on transplant surgery; and he has authored or co-authored over 600 publications that include manuscripts, abstracts and book chapters.

During his tenure at the University of Arizona, Dr. Rainer Gruessner was largely responsible for expanding their hepatopancreaticobiliary program, as well as the Department of Surgery as a whole. He built one of the nation’s largest programs for the treatment of chronic pancreatitis through total pancreatectomy and islet auto-transplantation. He not only introduced minimally invasive and robotic procedures in hepatopancreaticobiliary surgery but throughout all the subspecialty divisions, pushing some of them to become nationally-recognized leading centers for robotic surgical procedures.