Kornelis Poelstra, MD, PhD

Location: Allegiant Institute/Nevada Spine Clinic; President – The National Robotic Spine Institute

Date of appointment: 2018

Dr. Kornelis Poelstra is an orthopaedic- and neurological spine surgeon and is board certified since 2008. He specializes primarily in long-construct minimally invasive spine surgeries, adult spinal deformity, oncologic conditions, spinal fracture treatment and cervical disc replacements. He is one of the world leaders in Robotic Spine Surgery, assisted in the development of currently available robotic platforms and has performed more than 1,500 complex robotic cases thus far – more than any other surgeon in the world.

He has a wide-ranging research background in the prevention of implant associated wound infections, novel material sciences for both spine- as well as orthopaedic implant designs (e.g Molybdenum Rhenium) and worked on stem cell implantation for spinal cord injury. The mechanical- and cellular processes salient for the formation of a stable arthrodesis (spine fusions through optimized bone biology) and implant incorporation into the human body are of specific interest to him. He is an expert in disc replacement surgery and believes strongly in motion sparing technologies for the spine. He holds both Orthopaedic- and Neurosurgical Spine surgery training certificates from world leading institutions and received a PhD in Biomedical Engineering from the University of Groningen, The Netherlands.

Based on his extensive multi-platform robotic spine surgery experience, he has instructed surgeons all over the world with a strong focus on Asia and Europe. He has written dozens of peer reviewed publications, textbooks and chapters, and given more than 300 lectures thus far.