Gilberto Perez Rodriguez Garcia, MD

Very grateful to be surrounded by giants—remarkable individuals, neurosurgeons, and mentors—who inspire constant growth in all aspects of life🌟 @AliBaajMD @PeterNakajiMD @CNS_Update @BannerHealth @uarizona #Mentorship #Neurosurgery

@theamna1 @abdelbarrspine Missed you at AANS @theamna1!!

@abdelbarrspine I see you, @gilperezMD 🌟

Another great 1.5 days American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANS)! Gave another talk on Advanced Imaging but the best part was seeing colleagues, mentors, friends, mentees!@Dukeneurosurg

Amazing time at the AANS with amazing mentors!

Ali A. Baaj, MD, has been appointed to the Global Committee of the American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANS) for a two year term beginning in May. The Global Committee works to advance timely access to safe, affordable neurosurgical care worldwide by fostering collaboration and knowledge exchange among neurosurgeons. Dr. Baaj’s appointment reflects his ongoing commitment to neurosurgical education, advocacy and clinical excellence.

Congratulations to @StavTjoumakaris who just became the chair of the Neurosurgery Department @TJUHospital @TJUHNeurosurg , she has been a clinical and research trailblazer and I am confident that she will take the department to a different level! Congratulations very well deserved!

@MichaelCovell_ @BarrowNeuro @GUMedicine @mtlawton Congrats @MichaelCovell_ !! Amazing news!! Wish you all the success my friend!

Incredibly excited and grateful to have matched into #neurosurgery at @BarrowNeuro. Thank you to my family, friends, and mentors for making this dream possible. Thank you Dr. Lawton, Dr. Ponce, and Dr. Snyder for the opportunity of a lifetime! 🏜️

Please join us in welcoming our newest members to the @UAZNeurosurgery family on #MatchDay2026! We're excited to have the next generation stepping into one of the toughest (and most rewarding) fields in medicine. #Neurosurgery #BearDown @JuliePilitsis @CNSResidents @CNS_Update

👋 Say hello to our incoming neurosurgery residents! We are excited to welcome Annie Pico & Benjamin Klein to our neurosurgery residency program! We can't wait to see what they will accomplish! #UofLNeurosurgery #Match2026 @uofl @uoflmedschool @uoflhealth

Getting texts and calls from medical student mentees that they have matched into #neurosurgery is one of the most amazing feelings ever. For those who didn’t this time around, there’s always a way and a path. Keep your head up.

We have been helping IMGs match in Neurosurgery for the last 16 years in our post doc program @TJUHNeurosurg with a hit rate of 100%! This recent publication by our superstar post doc @Joannaroy99 shows that : 1-IMGs that match into neurosurgery demonstrate higher publication counts and greater research effort compared to U.S medical graduates 2-The proportion of high-effort publications relative to total publication output did not differ among both groups

@abdul_ghaith @NeurosurgeryUab @AUB_Lebanon @LebaUniversity @MayoClinicSOM @HopkinsMedicine @AUBMC_Official @UMBaltimore Congrats AK!! Very well deserved!! 🎊👏

August 4, 2020. The Beirut port explosion shattered my city. But the truth is, Lebanon had already been breaking long before that day. The economic collapse, the bankruptcy, the fear, the uncertainty, hospitals struggling to survive, and COVID pushing an already exhausted healthcare system even further, it felt like the ground was disappearing beneath all of us. Like many young physicians, I watched years of sacrifice suddenly lose their meaning. I was told I would need to redo years of training in a reality that no longer felt sustainable. For me, that was one of the most painful realizations of all, understanding that staying might mean watching the dream I had worked for my whole life slowly fade away. So I made the hardest decision of my life. I left Lebanon. I left my home, my city, my mentors, my friends, and the life I had always known. But the hardest part was leaving my family, my mother and father, whose sacrifices built me long before any title ever would, and my siblings, who carried my absence with love, patience, and strength. I left carrying grief, uncertainty, and one stubborn belief: this was not the end of my story. I came to the United States with $300 in my pocket and little more than determination. For nearly a year, I worked without pay, just trying to prove myself. I heard the doubts over and over again: “Stay in research.” “You probably won’t get into a PhD.” “This path is too hard. Forget about it.” “It will take too long.” But I kept going. Because sometimes faith has to speak louder than fear. Eventually, I was accepted into a PhD program at the #1 hospital in the world. Around that same time, one of the most beautiful chapters of my life began, I married the love of my life, just as things finally started becoming stable and my work became funded. They told me the PhD would take seven years. I finished it in three. Along the way, I secured more than four grants from a single project, led two major projects, and kept building when everything around me seemed to say slow down. At Mayo Clinic, I found a higher standard of excellence, discipline, rigor, humility, and a vision of what medicine and science can become when they are guided by purpose- a Neuroscientist. At Johns Hopkins: Research, innovation, and device development. I learned how to think bigger, work harder, and demand more from myself. Those years did not just train me, they transformed me- a biomedical engineer. And over time, the work grew into something I could never have imagined when I first arrived in this country: more than 120 publications and over 130 oral presentations and posters. But even then, something inside me had never changed. I missed the hospital. I missed patients. I missed the operating room. I missed the life I had always imagined for myself in medicine. So I made another difficult decision, to return fully to clinical medicine. That decision brought me to one of the most transformative chapters of my life: the University of Maryland Medical Center and Shock Trauma. There, surgeons, residents, nurses, mentors, and teams who challenged me, believed in me, sharpened me, and reminded me every day why I chose this path. The intensity of trauma, the discipline of surgery, and the privilege of caring for patients brought me back to my center. And through every chapter of this story, I was blessed with mentors who changed my life. People who opened doors for me when I could not yet see a way forward. People who corrected me, guided me, pushed me, and believed in me when the path was uncertain. I am deeply grateful to my mentors and to many others whose support I will carry with me forever. Today, after all of that, I am honored beyond words to share that I have matched as a PGY-2 Neurosurgery resident at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, one of the premier neurosurgical programs, renowned for its extraordinary surgical volume, pioneering innovation, and a legacy of mentorship.

Happy to announce that I’ve been selected to be a Deputy Editor for The Spine Journal thespinejournalonline.com , the official publication for @NASSspine North American Spine Society.   Please follow this link to submit your papers: editorialmanager.com/spinee/default…

@theamna1 @CNS_Update Always great seeing you at conferences and catching up! Excited for everything that’s ahead on this inspiring journey!

What makes #CNS2025 truly special isn’t just the science, it’s the people. The mentors who guide, the colleagues who inspire, and the friendships that turn this journey into something deeply meaningful. Grateful for every step of the journey. 💙

A huge welcome to our new Chair, Dr @DrNTheodore, a world-class neurosurgeon! Excited to see where he will bring the constantly growing #Neurosurgery Department at @BannerHealth @uarizona Amazing time ahead!

The Congress of Neurological Surgeons (CNS) has named Dr. Martina Stippler as its 76th President and the first woman to lead the 12,000-member organization. Congratulations to Dr. Stippler on this historic and well-deserved achievement! #BIDMC #BILH #CNS #neurology #surgery

First day as Chairman of Neurosurgery at the University of Arizona Phoenix College of Medicone and Physician Executive for Neurosciences at Banner Health!!! Banner/UA is an amazing partnership between a hospital system and an academic enterprise.

We reached a milestone of 250 recorded sessions on @virtualspine. A covid-era program that continues to run weekly and be an asset to the spine community. Thanks to the great team behind this work: 1. @WendeNGibbs 2. @MGalganoMD 3. @jrasouli 4. @NaderDahdaleh 5. @atmghn 6. @AJGrossbach 7. @Physiologyguy 8. @drmikeselby 9. @alfredoguiroymd 10. @theamna1 11. @KhoiThanMD 12. @JohnHShinMD 13. Griffin Baum 14. @AliBaajMD

A fresh set of books just arrived for our residents & fellows! Looking forward to the book signing at the annual @CNS_Update meeting in Los Angeles this fall. [Disclosure: All personal net proceeds are redirected for research & philanthropy]

Check this out! Another #research from the #spineTeam @BannerHealth! #Neurosurgery sciencedirect.com/science/articl…

Thank you ⁦@Medtronic⁩ for supporting this ⁦@NREFORG⁩ fund! I launched this initiative to help #IMGs pursue Neurosciences research in the U.S. I hope more friends and colleagues will consider giving to this important cause. share.google/Agi46hAoRWlPW4…