Dr. Thomas Chen, MD, PhD

Dr. Thomas Chen has served as the Chief Neurosurgeon & Oncology Officer of Cognos since 2016, and as member of the board since 2016. He is a physician, a board certified neurosurgeon, and the Director of Surgical Neuro-oncology at USC. He is also a tenured Professor of Neurosurgery and Pathology at USC. Dr. Chen received his MD from University of California, San Francisco (1988); he graduated from his neurosurgery residency training at the University of Southern California (1995). In order to prepare for his career in neuro-oncology, Dr. Chen obtained his PhD degree in pathobiology from the University of Southern California (1996). His thesis was on the role of immunotherapy in malignant brain tumors. He is a fellowship-trained spine surgeon (1997) and one of a few surgical neuro-oncologists in the country who specialize in spine cancer surgery. Currently, Dr. Chen maintains a clinical practice in both surgical neuro-oncology and spine surgery. He heads a research laboratory focused on glioma biology at USC and is involved in developing new and novel treatments for the treatment of brain and spinal tumor disease. He is also co-developing surgical therapies is based on the newest techniques in microdissection and image guidance using neuronavigational therapy. Dr. Chen is a member of several professional societies including the Congress of Neurological Surgeons, the American Association of Neurological Surgery, and the American Association of Cancer Research as well as several others. He is the recipient of many awards and peer recognition including being named one of Southern California Super Doctors by Los Angeles Magazine in 2015, one of America’s Top Surgeons in 2007 and one of America’s Top Oncologists (for Neuro-Oncology) in 2007. Dr. Chen has published extensively on glioma biology and neurosurgery. He is on the editorial board for The Spine Journal and Journal of Neuro-oncology, and is on the review board for Neurosurgery and Journal of Neurosurgery. Dr. Chen also serves on numerous national neurosurgery committees. Dr. Chen graduated summa cum laude in three years from the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, where he received Bronze Tablet honors (top 3% of undergraduate students) and was inducted into the Phi Beta Kappa national academic honor society. He attended the University of California, San Francisco, for medical school where he was inducted into the Alpha Omega Alpha national medical honor society. We believe Dr. Chen’s leadership experience in Neuro-oncology makes him an invaluable member of the board of directors.