Bio
Dr. Tiffany E. Chao is a board-certified general surgeon at Santa Clara Valley Medical Center (SCVMC), a Clinical Associate Professor of Surgery (Affiliated) in the Stanford Department of Surgery (Division of General Surgery), and an Adjunct Professor in the university's Program in Human Biology. At SCVMC, Dr. Chao is the Site Director for the Stanford medical student surgical clerkship and the Associate Site Director for the Stanford General Surgery Residency Program. Her interests in surgery include minimally invasive foregut, hernia, and colorectal surgery, in addition to acute care & trauma surgery.
At Stanford, she is the Primary Instructor of the undergraduate course HUMBIO 29: Introduction to Global Health and the medical school seminar SURG 236: Seminar in Global Surgery and Anesthesia, both Winter Quarter classes. Her other roles at Stanford include Faculty Fellow with Center for Innovation in Global Health and the Clinical Competency Committee of the General Surgery Residency. Dr. Chao's research interests are in global surgery, including cost-effectiveness analysis, surgical device innovation, and expansion of surgical delivery for low-income populations through surgical workforce and infrastructure development.
Dr. Chao holds dual Bachelor's degrees in Symbolic Systems and Psychology from Stanford University, as well as MD and MPH degrees from Mount Sinai School of Medicine, where she graduated with Alpha Omega Alpha honors. She completed General Surgery residency at the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, the Paul Farmer Global Surgery Research Fellowship at Harvard Medical School's Program in Global Surgery and Social Change, and the CTSA/Lucile Packard Innovation Fellowship at Stanford Biodesign. Through the Biodesign program, she co-founded Zenflow, Inc., a venture-backed medical device company working in minimally-invasive therapy for prostate disease, and is a Founding Partner of 4i Ventures.
In addition to being a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons since 2018, Dr. Chao was also elected to be an Overseas Fellow of The College of Surgeons of East, Central and Southern Africa (COSECSA) in 2022. She has also been appointed as an Extraordinary Senior Lecturer at the Centre for Global Surgery at Stellenbosch University in Cape Town, South Africa and serves on the Editorial Board of the World Journal of Surgery.
