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Prof Christopher Shen MD

Adjunct Professor, Medicine - Surgery
Academic Staff - Hourly - CSL, Surgery

BioDr. Christopher Shen is an Adjunct Professor in the Stanford School of Medicine, the Director of Global Programs at the Stanford Mussallem Center for Biodesign, and a member of the Stanford Biodesign Leadership Council. Dr. Shen is also the Founding Executive Director of the Singapore Stanford Biodesign Program.

Dr. Shen has been a longstanding member of the Stanford community since 1991, completing degrees in Biological Sciences, Biomechanical Engineering, Business, and Medicine. He has been teaching graduate and undergraduate students since 2001.

A strong proponent of interdisciplinary and experiential education, Dr. Shen has dedicated his career to teaching medical, engineering, and business students at Stanford and abroad in foundational concepts underpinning design-thinking, clinical immersion, ideation, rapid prototyping, innovation, and entrepreneurship. In addition, Dr. Shen is responsible for establishing and/or managing collaborations between Stanford and Biodesign-like programs on every continent except Antarctica! He continues to annually mentor diverse groups of students to develop and implement innovative medical solutions to serve patients around the world.

Dr. Shen is the founding and current U.S. Executive Director of Singapore Stanford Biodesign since its inception in 2010. As the first Biodesign program in East Asia, its mission is to train the next generation of medical technology innovators throughout the Pacific Rim, focusing on the unique medical needs in the region. Supported by Singapore's national level research institute, the Agency for Science, Technology, and Research (ASTAR), and the National Research Foundation (NRF), the program has uniquely built bridges across Asia, spanning Singapore, China, Indonesia, Taiwan, Korea, Australia, and Malaysia. In total, the program has trained 60 Fellows and hundreds of students throughout the region.

Dr. Shen is also a Partner at Novo Holdings, the asset manager of the Novo Foundation, one of the largest philanthropic organizations in the world. With headquarters in Denmark, Novo Holdings is committed to investing in innovative companies that improve the health of people and planet. Dr. Shen started his career in medical innovation as a Senior Design Engineer at Guidant Neurovascular, where he was the principal inventor of one of the original stentriever devices for ischemic stroke. He has been issued twelve patents in the fields of interventional neuroradiology and interventional cardiology.

Dr. Shen was a Stanford Asia/Pacific Scholar and a Paul & Daisy Soros Fellow.