Nicholas Theodore is an American neurosurgeon and researcher at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He is known for his work in spinal trauma, robotics and personalized medicine. He is Director of the Neurosurgical Spine Program at Johns Hopkins and Co-Director of the Carnegie Center for Surgical Innovation at Johns Hopkins. Dr. Theodore graduated from Cornell University, where he was the recipient of a Cornell Tradition Academic Fellowship. He attended medical school at Georgetown University, where he graduated with honors. After completing his internship at Bethesda Naval Hospital, Dr. Theodore served as a Senior GeneralMedical Officer with the United States Marine Corps in Okinawa, Japan. Dr. Theodore completed his neurosurgical residency and a fellowship in spinal surgery at the Barrow Neurological Institute. After completing his residency in 2001, Dr. Theodore served as Chief of the Division of Neurosurgery at Naval Medical Center San Diego, overseeing the largest neurosurgery complement in the Navy. In 2003, he joined the faculty at the Barrow Neurological Institute, and assumed the position of Director of Neurotrauma. In 2004 he was appointed Associate Director of the Neurosurgery Residency Program at Barrow. The Neurosurgery Residency Program at Barrow is the largest in the United States, training four residents per academic year, for a total of 28 residents. In 2009 he became the Chief of the Spine Section at the Barrow Neurological Institute and was appointed the Volker K.H. Sonntag Chair in 2015. In 2016 he became the second Donlin M. Long Professor of Neurosurgery & Orthopaeidcs at Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Theodore also holds a professorship in the Biomedical Engineering. His area of focus includes brain and spinal cord injury, minimally invasive surgery, robotics and personalized medicine. Dr. Theodore is also actively involved in the area of preventative medicine within neurosurgery. He has been associated with the ThinkFirst Foundation for several years actively having served as the foundation's Medical Director and President. In 2017, Dr. Theodore was appointed to the Head, Neck and Spine Committee of the National Football League.
Research
Dr. Theodore's main focus is on complex spinal disorders and spinal cord injury. He has published numerous peer-reviewed articles and book chapters, and has made over 200 technical presentations. He is the recipient of several awards, including the Mayfield Award and the Tasker Award from the Congress of Neurological Surgeons as well as being named a "US News Top Docs". He was one of the senior investigators in a multi-center study testing a new medication for spinal cord injury. Dr. Theodore has received an NIH RO-1 grant to study spinal injuries and novel approaches to spinal surgery. Less than 10% of these grants are funded nationally. In 2014, Dr. Theodore was the recipient of a DOD grant to conduct a multi-center study evaluating Cerebrospinal Fluid Drainage for the treatment of acute spinal cord injury. In 2010, Dr. Theodore founded Excelsius Surgical along with Neil Crawford and Mitch Foster, focusing on the development of a mobile real-time image-guided robot for spinal, brain, and biopsy applications. In 2014, he sold Excelsius Surgical to Globus Medical. In August 2017, the Globus Medical ExcelsiusGPS robot received 510k clearance by the FDA and Dr. Theodore performed the first case in the world on October 4, 2017.
Recent publications
Kalani MY, Filippidis A, Martirosyan NL, Theodore N. "Cerebral Herniation as a Complication of Chest Tube Drainage of Cerebrospinal Fluid After Injury to the Spine. World Neurosurg. 2011;
Kalb S, Martirosyan NL, Kalani MY, Broc GG, Theodore N. "Genetics of the Degenerated Intervertebral Disc. World Neurosurg. 2011;
