Brian Bateman

Professor and Chair of the Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative, and Pain Medicine

Welcome to the Stanford Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine!

We are proud of our department, which provides world-class clinical care, educates the next generation of leaders and innovators in anesthesia, and conducts cutting-edge research that advances human health and contributes to defining how the specialty will be practiced in the future.

Founded in 1960, the department has a storied history and its faculty have made important contributions to the field of anesthesiology. Most recently, the department benefited from 22 years of inspirational leadership by Ronald Pearl, MD, Ph.D. Under Dr. Pearl’s guidance, our Department became widely recognized as one of the leading anesthesia departments in the world.

Providing outstanding clinical care is at the heart of our mission. Our faculty are exceptional clinicians who provide highly skilled, compassionate and patient-centered care. They care for patients at Stanford Hospital and clinics, the Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital, the Veterans Affairs Palo Alto Health Care System, and the Santa Clara Valley Medical Center. The acuity and complexity of patients at Stanford’s hospitals are high, and our teams provide expert care to the sickest patients. We have world-class programs in all our clinical divisions: cardiac anesthesia, critical care medicine, obstetric anesthesia, pediatric anesthesia, multispecialty anesthesia, and pain medicine.

Our researchers lead high-impact basic, translational, clinical and population health programs. They make discoveries that transform the fields of anesthesiology, perioperative and pain medicine, advancing human health. They have been highly successful in attracting external funding; the department is consistently ranked among the top few anesthesiology departments for funding from the National Institutes of Health. A part of our mission is also to develop interested residents, fellows, and junior faculty as researchers. The resident research program, the Stanford Anesthesia Research and Medicine, or FARM, has been highly effective in this regard.

Education programs at Stanford Anesthesia aim to provide the environment and resources to help trainees fulfill their highest professional potential. We are the only department in the world that offers not only an anesthesiology residency, but also combined residencies in internal medicine/anesthesiology and pediatrics/anesthesiolgy, plus all six Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) anesthesiology fellowships.These and our other exceptional education programs are learner-oriented, innovative and comprehensive. They equip our trainees with the knowledge and skills to become outstanding anesthesiologists, ready to lead the field into the future. 

Rather uniquely, our medical center is located on the campus of one of the world’s leading research universities. This creates extraordinary opportunities for groundbreaking multidisciplinary research, as our anesthesiologists and pain medicine experts collaborate with leading scholars in other disciplines. Likewise, we work in the heart of Silicon Valley, an area at the epicenter of technological innovation. This inspires our clinicians and researchers to create patient-centered solutions to health care needs. 

Perhaps most importantly, Stanford Anesthesia values and is committed to the diversity, equity and inclusion of all its staff, residents, fellows and faculty. This serves as the basis for all we do. We aim to recruit, support, retain and promote diversity. Each division has faculty dedicated to creating scholarship opportunities, fostering inclusion, providing mentorship, and guiding education for its trainees and fellows, who assist us in addressing the health needs of a diverse patient population. Our clinicians endeavor to end the racial disparities in health care and promote equity. Likewise, we strive to create a department that reflects, in its trainees, faculty and leaders, the diversity of the community that Stanford serves. 

At Stanford Medicine, our mission is to care, educate and discover, and our vision is to heal humanity through science and compassion, one patient at a time. We invite you to explore our website to learn more about the extraordinary people and programs that comprise Stanford Anesthesia!

Brian T. Bateman, MD, MSc
Professor and Chair