Carlos José Velasquez Rodríguez

Carlos Velásquez is a Consultant Neurosurgeon at the Neurosurgery Department & Spine Unit at Hospital Universitario Marqués de Valdecilla (HUMV) and a researcher in the “Cell Signalling and Therapeutic Targets in Cancer” research group at IDIVAL, with a personal clinical and research interest in neuro-oncology. Upon completion of medical school at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Honduras, he underwent neurosurgical training at HUMV. He then completed the Ph.D. program at the University of Cantabria with a thesis on the role of hypoxia-dependent methylation in the regulation of ODZ1-dependent invasion in glioblastoma under the supervision of Dr. JL Fernández-Luna and Dr. Juan Martino. He was awarded the Wenceslao Lo´pez-Albo Grant from IDIVAL to pursue further sub-specialized training and develop a healthcare innovation project in the field of neuro-oncology. This allowed him to complete a Research Fellowship in Neuro-oncology at the McFeeters-Hamilton Center for Neuro-Oncology Research at the Princess Margaret Cancer Center in Toronto, Canada, under the supervision of Dr. Gelareh Zadeh (2017-2018) and the Neuro-Oncology and Skull Base Surgery clinical fellowship program (2018-2019) at the University of Toronto under the supervision of Dr. Gelareh Zadeh, Dr. Mark Bernstein, Dr. Fred Gentili, and Dr. Paul Kongkham. During this period, he participated in collaborative research projects on tumor hypoxia and the invasiveness of glioblastoma. In 2019 he joined the neurosurgery team at HUMV as a consultant neurosurgeon, where he develops his activity within the neuro-oncology neurosurgery unit. At HUMV he initiated and currently coordinates the Outpatient Neurosurgery program including the Outpatient Oncological Neurosurgery protocol. Besides, he is a review editor for Frontiers in Surgery and Frontiers in Oncology and an Ad-hoc reviewer for several journals in the field. He completed his neurosurgery board certification and became a Fellow of the European Board of Neurosurgery (FEBNS) and, among other awards, he has received the Garcia-Palomo Award and the SENEC scholarship for residents. He is also a member of the Spanish Neurosurgical Society (SENEC) and the European Association of Neurosurgical Societies.