Ara Darzi, Baron Darzi of Denham - Medical Career

Medical Career

Darzi joined Imperial College London in 1994, obtained his Professorship in 1996 and became the Chair of Surgery and Head of Department in 1998. Darzi holds the Paul Hamlyn Chair of Surgery at Imperial College London and the Institute of Cancer Research. He is also an honorary consultant surgeon at St Mary’s Hospital, and the Royal Marsden Hospital. He has held many senior administrative appointments within the Faculty of Medicine at Imperial College, Research Council, Editorial Board of Scientific Journals, and medical royal colleges.

Darzi was educated in Ireland, awarded an MD from Trinity College Dublin and the Fellowships of essentially all the Royal Colleges in the British Isles (Ireland FRCSI, England FRCS, and both Scottish Colleges FRCSed, FRCPSG). He also holds the Fellowship of the American College of Surgeons and has been elected as a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences and more recently an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering as the first Surgeon ever granted this honour. From 2005 to 2008 he was president of Bath Institute of Medical Engineering (BIME). In December 2008 he received an Honorary degree (Doctor of Engineering) from the University of Bath. In 2010 he was made a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians, an Honorary Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland, and an Honorary Fellow of the National Institute of Clinical Excellence.

Darzi’s main clinical and academic interest is in minimally invasive surgery and allied technologies in which he and his team are internationally recognized. He leads a team of researchers covering a wide spectrum of engineering and basic sciences research topics including Medical Image Computing, Biomedical Engineering, Clinical Safety, and Robotics. He has published more than 450 peer review papers and published 7 books.

This work has received international recognition including the Queens Anniversary Prize for Excellence in Higher and further education 2001, the Hamdan Award for Medical Research Excellence in 2004. In 2006 Darzi and his department were awarded the highly prestigious Rector’s Research Excellence Award for their work on Surgical Robots. He has also delivered many prestigious and named lectures around the globe.