Michael McDowell, MD

Michael McDowell, MD, joined the University of Pittsburgh Department of Neurological Surgery in 2022 after serving a fellowship at UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh.

Dr. McDowell is a graduate of the University of Pittsburgh neurosurgery residency program and the Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons medical school. In addition to his pediatric fellowship, he also completed a skull base fellowship at UPMC while a resident. He received undergraduate degrees in biochemistry and Latin dance from Arizona State University in 2005, graduating as valedictorian.

Dr. McDowell has been heavily involved in teaching since medical school and was voted clinician of the year for his educational contributions to the Columbia Student Medical Outreach clinic in Washington Heights. He is also the founder and director of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine’s mini-elective for second year medical students titled “Brain and Blade: The World of Neurosurgery.”

As well as general pediatric neurosurgery, Dr. McDowell has specific interests in skull base and cranio-cervical junction disorders in children. His research interests also include non-invasive monitoring and he is actively collaborating with investigators at Carnegie Mellon University in a clinical investigation using near infrared light to non-invasively measure intracranial pressure in adults and children. He is also the co-founder of Astria Biosciences, a company dedicated towards the early detection of brain aneurysms derived from research performed at UPMC.