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Dr. Michel Gagner was born in 1960 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
Dr. Gagner obtained a Diploma in Sciences at the Seminaire de Sherbrooke in 1978 and his M.D. from the Faculté de Médecine de l'Université de Sherbrooke in 1982. He did his surgical training at McGill University in Montreal from 1982 to 1988. During his residency, he completed 2 years of a Ph.D. program on human lipolysis in sepsis at the Royal Victoria Hospital at McGill University from 1984 to 1986. Dr. Gagner also completed fellowships in hepatic surgery at Hospital Villejuif in Paris, France and pancreaticobiliary surgery at Lahey Clinic Medical Center in Burlington, Massachusetts, from 1989 to 1990.
Upon completion of his fellowships, he was recruited to Université de Montréal, School of Medicine, Hôtel-Dieu de Montreal, where he was Assistant Professor of Surgery from 1990 to 1995. Following this, Dr. Gagner worked at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation in Cleveland where he co-founded the Minimally Invasive Surgery Center from 1995 to 1998. Dr. Gagner was appointed the Franz Sichel Professor of Surgery and Director of the Minimally Invasive Surgery Center of Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, from 1998 to 2003. He then joined Weill Medical College of Cornell University in New York, as Professor of Surgery and Chief of the Section of Laparoscopic and Bariatric Surgery from 2003 to 2007. He was until recently, Chair of the Department of Surgery at the Mount Sinai Medical Center in Miami and Professor of Surgery at Florida International University, and is currently Professor of Surgery in Montreal.
Dr. Gagner is known for his contributions in the field of Minimally Invasive Surgery, in particular the first description of laparoscopic adrenalectomy for Cushing syndrome and pheochromocytoma in 1992, the first description of laparoscopic pancreatectomy, distal and proximal, from 1992 to 1993, the first description of endoscopic neck surgery with parathyroidectomy in 1995, the first transgastric cholecystectomy in 1997, the first description of a laparoscopic duodenal switch for obesity in 1999 and laparoscopic sleeve gastrectomy in 2000. More recently, Dr. Gagner was co-surgeon for the first world transatlantic robotic cholecystectomy, between New York City and Strasbourg, France. It is the only surgical article published in Nature in 2001.
He has over 300 published journal articles, 40 book chapters, and 8 books on minimally invasive surgery. He has been a visiting professor and operated in over 60 institutions in 48 countries. He has held prominent positions in more than 35 societies and organizations and has served on the editorial boards of 12 surgical journals.
Dr. Gagner has also received a number of honorary memberships and awards throughout his career. His most recent contributions focus on innovative upper digestive tract surgery such as bariatric and endoluminal gastric procedures.