Cloward Award Recipient
2022: Gary K Steinberg, MD, PhD
Professor and Former Chair of Neurosurgery and the Neurosciences, Stanford University
Lecture: A Lifelong odyssey to understand and treat cerebrovascular disease, with a few detours
Bernard and Ronni Lacroute-William Randolph Hearst Professor of Neurosurgery and the Neurosciences Founder and Co-Director, Stanford Stroke Center Former Chair (1995-2020), Department of Neurosurgery Stanford University
Gary K. Steinberg was raised in Westchester County, New York and graduated summa cum laude with Honors in Biology from Yale University. Before attending medical school, he studied classical trumpet on a scholarship at the Institute for Advanced Musical Studies in Montreux, Switzerland. He graduated with an M.D. and Ph.D. in Neurosciences in 1980 from Stanford University, where he also completed his neurosurgical residency under Dr. John Hanbery. His dedication to the understanding and treatment of cerebrovascular disorders began during his training, where he received an NIH NINDS Award to investigate aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage and when he spent a formative year studying cerebrovascular surgery with Dr. Charles Drake in London, Ontario.
Dr. Steinberg joined the faculty at Stanford in 1987 and served as Chair of the Department of Neurosurgery from 1995-2020. He founded the Stanford Stroke Center and the Stanford Moyamoya Center, where he remains as co-director. He continues his busy clinical practice specializing in cerebrovascular surgery and leads a large clinical research team focused on developing innovative approaches for treating patients with complex cerebrovascular disorders. He has trained scores of residents, with students and fellows coming from all over the world to be trained and mentored by him. His lab has also spearheaded novel neuroprotective and neurorestorative techniques, which has led to some of the world’s first clinical trials of stem cell transplantation for chronic stroke and subacute spinal cord injury. His research has been continuously funded by the NIH since 1987 and he holds research grants from numerous other bodies, generating research work that has resulted in over 500 publications.
Dr. Steinberg has been a recipient of many honors, including the Congress of Neurological Surgeons Charles Drake Lecturership, the American Stroke Association Innovation Award, Society of Neurological Surgeons H. Richard Winn Prize, the Smithsonian American Ingenuity Award, the American Association of Neurological Surgeons/Congress of Neurological Surgeons Ralph G. Dacey Medal for Outstanding Cerebrovascular Research and the California Association of Neurological Surgeons, Byron Cone Pevehouse Distinguished Service Award. One of his proudest honors was to serve as President of the Western Neurosurgical Society in 2015 (Kaua’i), with his wife, Sandra Garritano as first lady of the Western. He is equally proud of his son Jeff, who is a cerebrovascular neurosurgeon and his daughter Liz, who is a child psychologist.
