Brian Bateman, MD, Named Chair of the Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine

February 10, 2021

Brian Bateman, MD, Chief of the Division of Obstetric Anesthesia and Vice Chair for Faculty Development in the Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, has been appointed Stanford Medicine’s Chair of the Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine.

Dr. Bateman is one of the nation’s foremost experts on obstetric anesthesia and a strong advocate for the reduction of opioid use during pregnancy and the postpartum period. He has contributed broadly to national health policy through various advisory roles with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, The Joint Commission, National Institutes of Health, and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Also a gifted clinician-scientist and prominent health care leader, Dr. Bateman is uniquely qualified to further elevate our nationally recognized Department of Anesthesiology.

Dr. Bateman’s NIH-funded research is focused on pharmacoepidemiology in pregnancy and the epidemiology of pregnancy-related conditions. In 2017, he helped found and is a co-director of the Harvard Program on Perinatal and Pediatric Pharmacoepidemiology (H4P) at Brigham and Women’s Hospital/Harvard Medical School. Throughout his career, he has published extensively on the safety of cardiovascular and pain medications in pregnancy, predictors of severe maternal morbidity and mortality, and medication safety in the perioperative period in leading clinical journals including JAMA, BMJ, and the Annals of Internal Medicine.

Dr. Bateman is a prolific writer and reviewer and was an editor for the latest edition of Chestnut’s Obstetric Anesthesiology, the field’s foremost textbook, and is currently an editor for the journal Anesthesiology. In 2019, he was nominated to be an honorary citizen of Hanoi, Vietnam, for leading a collaboration between Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the Hanoi Hospital for Obstetrics and Gynecology.

Throughout his career and especially as department vice chair for Faculty Development and chief of Obstetric Anesthesia, Dr. Bateman has prioritized the creation of just environments and the empowerment of all community members. These efforts include the recruitment of academically-oriented diverse faculty and the strong support and mentorship of junior faculty members, especially women and those from groups underrepresented in medicine.

Deep appreciation is owed to the search committee — led by Ron Dalman, MD, and Mary Leonard, MD — for their exceptional efforts to conduct this search during the pandemic. Stanford Medicine expresses immense gratitude for the brilliance, vision, and dedication of Ronald Pearl, MD, PhD. His leadership of the Department of Anesthesia for more than two decades has been exemplary. Dr. Pearl transformed the department into one of the premier programs in the country, noted both for its research and its clinical excellence.

Both David Entwistle, president and CEO of Stanford Health Care, and Paul King, president and CEO of Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford and Stanford Children’s Health, strongly support Dr. Bateman’s appointment. Because of complications related to the pandemic, Dr. Bateman will assume his new role on October 15. Dr. Pearl has agreed to continue as Chair until then.