Michael Chen, M.D.

Duarte, CA
Neurosurgery

EDUCATION AND TRAINING:
Medical School: Pennsylvania State University and Thomas Jefferson University
Board Certification: Neurosurgery

 

 

SUMMARY:
Dr. Michael Y. Chen, M.D., Ph.D., joined our faculty as an assistant professor of neurosurgery in January 2007. Dr. Chen has particular interest in the treatment of primary and metastatic disease of the brain and spine, and is actively co-leading the establishment of a new spine program.

As a researcher, Dr. Chen has authored or co-authored over 30 original papers, abstracts and book chapters covering novel genetic and biomedical engineering approaches for the treatment of central nervous system diseases. Dr. Chen focuses his research efforts on examination of individualized therapy for glioblastoma patients based the treatment response of surrogate rodent models, and intraoperatively delivered T-cell immunotherapy for metastatic brain tumors for which a clinical trial is currently in the preparatory stages. In the lab his interests include catheter-guided intraparenchymal delivery of small molecule inhibitors, viral and non-viral gene therapy vectors for the treatment of metastatic brain tumors.

Dr. Chen comes to the City of Hope from the Virginia Commonwealth University Hospitals, where he served as an assistant professor. He attended a combined B.S./M.D. program at Pennsylvania State University and Thomas Jefferson University (1996). Between his second and third years of medical school, Dr. Chen obtained a masters degree in biomedical engineering from the John Hopkins University (1994). After a surgical internship, again at Johns Hopkins, he became a research fellow at the Surgical Neurology Branch of the National Institutes of Health, where studied nanoparticle and viral gene delivery using high-flow micro-infusion. Dr. Chen then performed his neurosurgical residency at the Virginia Commonwealth University Hospitals. During this time, he also obtained his Ph.D., which examined the effect of Wilms' Tumor 1 silencing on glioblastoma programmed cell death.