Virendra Desai, MD
Surgical Director, CHLA Epilepsy Center.
Dr. Virendra Desai is the Surgical Director of the CHLA Epilepsy Center. He first found a passion for medicine in college, where he studied neuroscience. In medical school, he quickly developed an interest in neurosurgery – specifically, the ability to “hands-on” improve a patient’s health and quality of life, while immersing in a highly academic field. He partook in stroke imaging research that was NIH-funded. He completed a neurosurgery residency at Houston Methodist Hospital, finding joy in the smiles of his pediatric patients and was motivated to pursue a fellowship in pediatric neurosurgery at Riley Children’s Hospital. He currently focuses on surgical epilepsy and movement disorders, particularly enjoying not only stopping a child’s seizures, but also seeing the child grow into the person they were meant to become – cognitively, socially, behaviorally and psychologically. He has authored over 60 peer-reviewed publications, has experience building state-of-the-art comprehensive epilepsy, movement disorder and chronic pain programs, plays an integral role in training the next generation of neurosurgeons and performs the most advanced surgical techniques including robotic-assistance, minimally invasive procedures, deep brain stimulation, responsive neurostimulation, selective dorsal rhizotomy and nerve decompressions.