Background
Thomas Mindermann was born on March 10, 1955 in Schopfheim, West-Germany and arrived in Switzerland in 1975 and studied medicine at the University of Basel, Switzerland graduating in 1983. He earned a medical doctorate with supervisors Prof. Dr. U.F. Gruber & Prof. Dr. M. Allgöwer at the University of Basel in 1984. He was board-certified as a neurosurgeon in Switzerland in 1995. During his residency and thereafter, he engaged in clinical- and lab-research joining the microdialysis group at the Surgical Department of Research at the University Hospital of Basel. He spent a postdoctoral fellowship with Prof. Dr. C.B. Wilson as a Senior Pituitary Research Fellow at the Department of Neurological Surgery at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) from 1992 until 1993. He worked as a resident and then as an attending neurosurgeon with chairman Prof. Dr. O. Gratzl at the Department of Neurosurgery of the University Hospitals of Basel until 1999. There, he earned a habilitation in neurosurgery and was appointed a Lecturer of Neurosurgery at the University of Basel in 1999.
In 2000, PD Dr. med. Thomas Mindermann joined the Hirslanden Hospitals of Zurich and Aarau where he conducted cerebral- and spinal neurosurgery. In addition, he performed neuro-radiosurgery with the Gamma Knife and the CyberKnife until his retirement in 2021. He served as the Medical Director of the Gamma Knife Center Zurich from 2000 until its decommissioning in 2009 and he served on the Board of Medical Directors of Hirslanden Klinik Im Park in Zurich from 2001 until his retirement in 2021.
As part of his university and public services, Mindermann supervised doctoral theses, gave final medical exams and neurosurgical board exams. He regularly took part in academic teaching of undergraduate medical students at the University of Basel and in postgraduate teaching of neurosurgical residents. He served as the Secretary of the Swiss Neurosurgical Society and as the society’s President of the Commission on Radiosurgery. He regularly publishes in refereed journals, works as a translator of books on science outreach and serves as a reviewer of scientific publications. Thomas Mindermann continues to serve on the Editorial Boards of “Acta Neurochirurgica, The European Journal of Neurosurgery” and of “Surgical Neurology International”.
