I graduated with Honours and the Peter Bishop Medal from the University of Sydney’s BSc(Med) Program in 1992, and with Honours and the Robert Craig Prize for Surgery from the University of Sydney’s Medical School in 1995. After my surgical internship at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in Sydney, I was accepted for neurosurgery training at the Mayo Clinic, having visited there as a medical student a few years earlier. I lived in Rochester Minnesota from 1996 to 2005, where I was the Thoralf Sundt Research Fellow (1999-2001) and also completed my entire neurosurgical clinical training and biomedical PhD at the Mayo. I trained under neurosurgical masters, Doctors David Piepgras and Fredric Meyer. I then undertook a neurosurgery specialisation Fellowship in Phoenix Arizona. That highly competitive and top U.S. surgical Fellowship under Doctor Robert Spetzler, Director of the Barrow Neurological Institute, focused on microsurgical techniques and operative approaches dealing with vascular conditions and tumours affecting the brain and skull base. During my year in Phoenix, I co-wrote the book “The Brain Aneurysm” with Dr Spetzler. I have subsequently also sought and diligently gained expertise in minimally invasive spinal surgery techniques and state-of-the-art medically-evidenced spinal implants / prosthetics.

My younger brother, neurologist and neuroscientist Prof. Vik Khurana MD PhD, runs the Khurana Lab at Harvard, is a Scientific Founder of Yumanity Therapeutics, and is Chair of Movement Disorders at Brigham & Women’s Hospital, Boston.

I am a member of the Neurosurgical Society of Australasia (NSA), Congress of Neurological Surgeons (CNS – USA) and Australasian Society of Aerospace Medicine (ASAM). I am registered nationally as a specialist (Neurosurgeon). I am committed to patient welfare and Public health and to the advancement of medical research and education. Among the awards that I have been fortunate to have received following my medical graduation are:

• the ‘Grand Prize in Cardiovascular Pharmacology‘ American Society for Pharmacology & Experimental Therapeutics, 2000;
• ‘Congress of Neurological Surgeons (USA) Galbraith Award for Cerebrovascular Research’, 2003;
• ‘Certificate of Excellence for Patient Care & Team Work‘ Mayo Clinic/St Marys Hospital, 2003;
• ‘Mayo Clinic Scholarly Achievement Award for Distinguished Academic Achievement During Neurosurgical Residency’, 2005;
• ‘Award for Best “Advances in Clinical Practice” Presentation’ Canberra Hospital, 2007;
• and the Australian Capital Territory ‘Quality in Healthcare Award for Safety‘, 2007.

I am the Director of C.N.S. Neurosurgery, established in 2014 in Canberra & Sydney, then also in Batehaven NSW & Melbourne VIC. Since the pandemic, I carry out surgeries at Hurstville Private Hospital, Sydney. I am grateful that in June 2021, C.N.S. Neurosurgery has been independently recognised by ThreeBestRated as being one of Sydney’s top three neurosurgical practices.

I am also an established medical telehealth provider (the first surgeon to be certified for such by the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons) and one of Australia’s leading (and truly independent) medical experts in Neurosurgery, consulting privately in person in Sydney and Canberra and via video-IME nationally (and internationally). I have done over 1700 medicolegal assessments and reports since 2009. My opinions are highly regarded nationally for their honesty and forensic approach. I have provided expert testimony in Australia’s Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT), ACT and NSW’s Supreme Courts, Washington DC’s Superior Court, as well as to AHPRA/The Medical Board of Australia, the Australian Federal Senate, and in Coronial Inquests. I have been an invited member of an expert panel of the Law Council of Australia (2019) on the subject of concurrent expert medical evidence, and an invited speaker for the Australian Lawyers Alliance (2022). My medicolegal company is CNS Medicolegal. I am also a licensed fixed wing aircraft pilot, and often fly myself between states for my work.

I am delighted to provide personalised and contemporary neurosurgical opinion, advice and operative care, and to be available for my patients and their doctors as part of a bespoke private practice model that equally welcomes patients who do not have private health insurance.

*Please note that “second opinion” appointments are not permitted by CNS Neurosurgery if patients have relatively recently been operated by another neurosurgeon or spinal surgeon.

Dr Dianne Khurana

MBBS (Hons, Syd), PhD (Mayo Clinic), MBioethics (Syd), Grad Dip Med (Perioperative Medicine; Monash)

• Surgical Assistant & Perioperative Care (Hurstville Private Hospital)