Susana Vacas, MD, PhD
Susana Vacas, MD, PhD, is a neuroanesthesiologist, clinician innovator, investigator, and educator at the Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School. She completed her postdoctoral work at the University of California, San Francisco, where her research focused on the underlying mechanisms and risk factors of perioperative neurocognitive disorders, a set of debilitating, costly, and increasingly pervasive conditions and illnesses.
Dr. Vacas seeks to enhance perioperative brain health and overall patient outcomes after surgery by blocking and/or alleviating exacerbated inflammation and associated brain lesions. Whether through new benchwork techniques, the creation of molecular targets, extensive cognitive assessment models, novel MRI, or machine learning, her investigations use innovative technologies to advance our scientific understanding of brain health and create clinical interventions to prevent cognitive decline associated with anesthesia and surgery.
With continuous research funding from multiple philanthropic, institutional, and national resources, her contributions to neuroscience and perioperative brain health are propelling the field forward while helping steer major initiatives that aim to prevent brain injury after surgery. She takes great pride in teaching and mentoring residents, research fellows, and medical students at Mass General Brigham and throughout the world.