Dr. Galal Elsayed is an award-winning neurosurgeon with advanced fellowship training in endoscopic, minimally invasive, and complex reconstructive spine surgery from Washington University in St. Louis. Dr. Elsayed has training in the use of augmented reality and robotics, and has personally pioneered surgical planning using virtual reality/spatial computing for minimally invasive spine surgery and complex spinal reconstructions. Dr. Elsayed’s practice treats the full spectrum of spinal disorders, including disc herniations, age-related arthritis, infections, primary and metastatic spinal tumors, fractures, spinal cord injury, congenital anomalies, scoliosis, and kyphosis. Using cutting-edge technology, Dr. Elsayed personalizes his surgical approach with a focus on safety for every patient using three-dimensional planning in virtual reality. A significant portion of Dr. Elsayed’s practice is dedicated to revision surgeries for patients who have had prior spine surgery. Dr. Elsayed uses and is involved in the development of cutting-edge surgical technology such as intraoperative navigation, ultra-minimally invasive endoscopy, and the use of spatial computing platforms. Dr. Elsayed’s most prized focus is on patient education; he enjoys showing patients their spine in virtual reality during clinic visits.
TRAINING
Dr. Elsayed earned both his undergraduate degree in molecular microbiology and his medical degree at the University of Central Florida, then completed his residency in neurological surgery at the University of Alabama in Birmingham. He has also completed a fellowship in complex and minimally invasive spinal deformity at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. A three-time winner of the Richard B. Morawetz Research Award at UAB, Dr. Elsayed was invited to the White House in 2020 to make a research presentation to the White House Fellow for Health and Human Services.
RESEARCH
Dr. Elsayed has received numerous awards for his research, including the Griffith R. Harsh III Research Award and the Richard B. Morawetz Research Award (three years in a row), where he was also named the University of Alabama-Birmingham Clinical Research Buchalter Scholar in 2019. He has twice been awarded a Society for Minimally Invasive Spine Surgery (SMISS) Young Surgeon’s Grant and has received the Cervical Spine Research Society Scholarship. He has published dozens of peer-reviewed papers on neurological surgery and contributed a chapter to Dr. Ali Baaj’s recent edition of the Handbook of Spine Surgery. He has also authored a chapter in Dr. Nitin Agarwal’s Surviving Neurosurgery. Dr. Elsayed is also an entrepreneur who founded Neurite, an artificial intelligence company that has worked with the United States Department of Defense and the Advanced Regenerative Medicine Institute for pandemic relief during the Covid-19 pandemic. Dr. Elsayed has presented at the Congress of Neurological Surgeons, the American Association of Neurological Surgeons, and has been invited to the United States White House to present his research to Health and Human Services.
LANGUAGES
Dr. Elsayed speaks English and Arabic (Egyptian)
