Established in 2014 by lead donors Dr. and Mrs. IRVING SHERMAN and Mr. and Mrs. JOSH E. FIDLER and generous gifts from Mr. and Mrs. LEONARD ATTMAN, Mr. and Mrs. GEORGE BERRY, Drs. HENRY and RACHEL BREM, Dr. and Mrs. BENJAMIN S. CARSON SR., Drs. PETER and JANE COLEMAN, Mr. and Mrs. HARVEY M. MEYERHOFF, Mr. and Mrs. GEORGE PASTER, Mrs. BABETTE ROSENBERG, Mr. BRUCE ROSENBERG, the SIEGEL RINGLER FAMILY, and Mr. and Mrs. BARRY WESSLER.
HENRY BREM, the Harvey Cushing Professor and Director of the Department of Neurosurgery, joined the faculty in 1984 and has built one of the largest brain tumor research and treatment centers in the world. He reinstituted Hopkins’ Hunterian Neurosurgery Research Laboratory, originally founded by Hopkins’ first neurosurgeon, Harvey Cushing, with a new focus on medical and surgical therapies for brain tumors. Dr. Brem has changed the surgical treatment of brain tumors by introducing new approaches for targeted therapy. His work in developing a polymer wafer for direct delivery of chemotherapy into the brains of patients with brain tumors led to the first FDA approval of a brain tumor treatment, Gliadel ®, in 23 years. As a teacher and mentor, Dr. Brem has trained numerous researchers. His trainees currently lead 11 different brain tumor centers around the world. His inspiring teaching was recognized in 1996 when he received the Hopkins Professors’ Award for Excellence in Teaching. In 1998, he was elected to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences, and in 2000 he was awarded the Grass Award by the Society of Neurological Surgeons for meritorious research. In 2001, he received the Founders Award of the Controlled Release Society; in 2004 he received the New York University Distinguished Alumni Award and was named the Coleman Fellow in Life Sciences at Ben-Gurion University. In 2011, he delivered the commencement address for the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He has been recognized by the Castle Connolly Guide each year in “America’s Top Doctors,” and in “America’s Top Doctors for Cancer.” In 2013, the Society for NeuroOncology and the Section on Tumors of the AANS/CNS named him as the recipient of the Abhijit Guha Award.
The Professorship is held by Henry Brem and will be used to further advance brain tumor research at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.