Dr. Brian Kwon is an internationally recognized, award-winning surgeon-scientist with the Vancouver Spine Surgery Institute at Vancouver General Hospital.
Dr. Kwon completed his residency in orthopaedic surgery at the University of British Columbia in 2000, and then went on to complete a PhD in neuroscience at UBC, studying spinal cord injury repair. In 2003 he completed a year of advanced spine surgery fellowship training in Philadelphia at the Rothman Institute, Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, one of the busiest spine trauma hospitals in the United States.
Now, as a Professor in the Department of Orthopaedics, UBC, Dr. Kwon’s current surgical practice is focused on the management of adult spine trauma, spinal cord injuries and non-traumatic conditions including spine infection, cancer, deformity and disc degeneration. Dr. Kwon is active in the training of orthopaedic and neurosurgical residents, and is currently the Co-Director of the UBC Spine Fellowship Training Program which trains three spine surgeons from around the world each year.
In addition to his clinical practice, Dr. Kwon leads an active basic science and clinical research program in spinal cord injury and spine trauma. He holds a Canada Research Chair in Spinal Cord Injury and the Marcel Dvorak Chair in Spinal Trauma at VGH for his innovation and leadership in developing treatments for this catastrophic injury. Dr. Kwon’s basic science laboratory resides within the International Collaboration on Repair Discoveries (ICORD), where he is a Principal Investigator and the Associate Director of Clinical Research. Dr. Kwon is the Director of Research for the Vancouver Spine Research Program, and the Co-Director of the UBC Spine Surgery Fellowship.
Dr. Kwon has authored more than 220 scientific research manuscripts in peer-reviewed journals, and has written over 35 textbook chapters. His research innovation has garnered him the Kappa Delta Young Investigator Award from the Orthopaedic Research Society, and he was chosen by the Canadian Orthopaedic Association to represent Canada as a North American Travelling Fellow (2003) and American-British-Canadian Travelling Fellow (2011) to deliver lectures around the world. He was recognized by Business in Vancouver in 2009 as one of the province’s Top 40 under Forty for his leadership in the field of spinal cord injury research. Dr. Kwon is an active lecturer and has been invited to deliver keynote speeches on spinal cord injury research in Canada and the United States, and around the world in places such as Australia, Korea, India and South Africa. His research has been recognized and supported by funding agencies around the world, including the Canadian Institutes for Health Research (CIHR), Canadian Stem Cell Network, Canadian Foundation for Innovation, the United States Department of Defense, Paralyzed Veterans of America, Craig Neilsen Foundation, Wings for Life Foundation, the Rick Hansen Institute, and Brain Canada.
For more information regarding Dr. Kwon’s published research, please click here.
https://orthopaedics.med.ubc.ca/spinal-cord-injury-research-at-ubc-receives-48m-grant/