Youssef Fares (Arabic: يوسف فارس) is a Lebanese neurosurgeon, academic and healthcare leader. He is a Professor and the Dean of the Lebanese University Faculty of Medicine, where he also serves as the founding director of the Neuroscience Research Center. ^[1][2] Fares is also the CEO and Chairman of Al-Zahraa Hospital University Medical Center,^[2][3] the founding president of the Lebanese Association of Spine Surgery and the Senior Executive Vice President of the World Academy of Medical Sciences.^[4][5] In addition, he serves as an editor for the neurosurgical journal Surgical Neurology International.^[6][3]

In March 2020, Fares was elected into the European Academy of Sciences and Arts.^[1][7]

Fares was born and raised in Lebanon. In 1982, he moved to Spain to attain an MD from the University of Granada in 1987 and a PhD in Medicine and Surgery summa cum laude from the Autonomous University of Madrid in 1992.^[1] He also finished an Executive MBA with honors from the American University of Technology in 2019.

Fares completed his training in neurosurgery at the Hospital Universitario Fundación Jiménez Díaz [es] of the Autonomous University of Madrid and attained his Board Certification from the Spanish Ministry of Education and Science in 1993.^[1] He further pursued numerous fellowships in stereotactic neurosurgery at the Hospital Infanta Cristina de Badajoz, pediatric neurosurgery at the Hôpital de la Timone [fr], epilepsy surgery at the Maudsley Hospital and neuronavigation at the Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital.

Since 1994, Fares has been a member of the faculty of medicine at the Lebanese University, where he is a professor. In 2020, he was appointed the Dean of the Faculty of Medicine. In 2014, he established the Neuroscience Research Center at the university that he currently serves as the Founding Director.^[1][3] He previously led the Department of Neurosurgery as its Chairman between 2009 and 2020 and served as the Associate Dean of the Faculty of Medicine from 2012 to 2020.^[4]

In 2016, Fares was appointed the CEO and Chairman of Al-Zahraa Hospital–University Medical Center, a medical center in Lebanon.^[2] He transitioned the hospital to a full academic medical center.^[2]

Fares was appointed as the Senior Executive Vice President of the World Academy of Medical Sciences in 2017.^[4] In 2018, he established a headquarters for the academy in Beirut to serve the MENA region.

Fares is a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons, a Fellow of the International College of Surgeons and an International Member of the American Association of Neurological Surgeons.^[1][2]

Fares’s research in neurosurgery, neuroscience and conflict medicine led to more than 100 peer-reviewed publications that range between books, book chapters, original articles, reviews, editorials and conference proceedings.^[1][7][3] He co-developed the Fares Scale of Injuries due to Cluster Munitions to evaluate functional impairment in victims of cluster munitions.^[4]

Fares was elected into the European Academy of Sciences and Arts in 2020.^[1][5][3] He is also an elected Fellow of the World Academy of Medical Sciences since 2017.^[4][7]