Rainer Gruessner has been a highly dedicated professional in the field of surgery since obtaining his Doctorate in 1983 and his Professorial Thesis in 1991. His drive and dedication to the advancement of the practice of surgery is illustrated by his numerous clinical achievements, various publications, and his successful career.


Rainer Gruessner has a long list of accomplishments that he has conducted over the years. Among the list are notables such as: developed the first standardized technique for living donor intestinal transplants in 1997, conducted the first preemptive living donor liver transplant for oxalosis in 1998, the first laparoscopic living donor distal pancreatectomy and nephrectomy in 2000, and the first robot-assisted total pancreatectomy with islet autotransplant in 2012.

His accomplishments do not only come in the form of innovative surgical procedures, as he has also helped each organization that he has been a part of to excel in their national reputations. He rebuilt the University of Arizona’s Department of Surgery by recruiting 60+ new faculty members including 6 nationally reputed division chiefs, establishing three new divisions, and various new clinical programs. Additionally, he tripled the department’s total grant support, quadrupled the Department of Surgery’s National Institutes of Health grant support, and helped move the International Pancreas Transplant Registry to the University of Arizona as one of only two independent international solid-organ transplant registries in the world.

His proudest accomplishment has been to successfully recruit superb teams of like-minded, highly productive and efficient surgeon-scientists who share his goals of exceeding in clinical care and innovation, research and education, and in building new clinical programs that did not exist at the institution before his being there.

Rainer Gruessner is the former Chairman of the Department of Surgery at the University of Arizona, Chief of Transplantation, and a Professor of Surgery and Immunology of the College of Medicine. He is married to Angelika Gruessner, M.S., Ph.D., with whom he shares two children.