Pejam Ghanouni

Pejman Ghanouni, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor, Department of Radiology, Stanford University School of Medicine; Director of the Stanford Focused Ultrasound Center of Excellence

Research description: Dr. Ghanouni is a diagnostic radiologist with expertise in MR imaging. His research centers on the development of clinical applications of MR guided high intensity focused ultrasound (MRgFUS). Currently, he and his colleagues have designed a trial testing the use of MRgFUS for the treatment of advanced pancreatic cancer. He has also served as the Principal Investigator or co-Director at Stanford University of multi-center trials using MRgFUS to palliate pain from metastases to bone, to treat uterine fibroids, to perform thalamotomy to treat essential tremor, and to treat focal prostate cancer. He has translated these trials into established clinical services to treat bone metastases, uterine fibroids, and essential tremor. Dr. Ghanouni has been designated as the Director of the Stanford Focused Ultrasound Center of Excellence by the Focused Ultrasound Foundation.

Dr. Ghanouni collaborates with PCRG members, including Drs. Arash Alizadeh, Maximilian Diehn, George Fisher, Sam Gambhir, Joo Ha Hwang, and Shreyas Vasanawala.

Selected relevant publications (Stanford PCRG members in bold):

  1. Dababou S, Marrocchio C, Rosenberg J, Bitton R, Pauly KB, Napoli A, Hwang JH, Ghanouni P. A meta-analysis of palliative treatment of pancreatic cancer with high intensity focused ultrasound. Journal of therapeutic ultrasound. 2017; 5:9.

  2. Dababou S, Marrocchio C, Scipione R, Erasmus HP, Ghanouni P, Anzidei M, Catalano C, Napoli A. High-Intensity Focused Ultrasound for Pain Management in Patients with Cancer. Radiographics. 2018 Mar-Apr;38(2):603-623. PMID: 29394144

  3. D’Souza AL, Chevillet JR, Ghanouni P, Yan X, Tewari M, Gambhir SS. Tumor characterization by ultrasound-release of multiple protein and microRNA biomarkers: preclinical and clinical evidence. PLOS One. PLOS One. 2018 Mar 16; 13(3):e0194268

  4. Ghanouni P, Dobrotwir A, Bazzocchi A, Bucknor M, Bitton R, Rosenberg J, Telischak K, Busacca M, Ferrari S, Albisinni U, Walters S, Gold G, Ganjoo K, Napoli A, Pauly KB, Avedian R. Magnetic resonance-guided focused ultrasound treatment ofextra-abdominal desmoid tumors: a retrospective multicenter study. European radiology. 2017; 27(2):732-740.

  5. Ghanouni P, Kishore S, Lungren MP, Bitton R, Chan L, Avedian R, Bazzocchi A, Butts Pauly K, Napoli A, Hovsepian D. Treatment of low-flow vascular malformations of the extremities using MR-guided high intensity focused ultrasound: preliminary experience. J Vasc Interv Radiol. 2017 Dec;28(12):1739-1744. PMID: 29157478

  6. Federau C, Goubran M, Rosenberg J, Henderson J, Halpern CH, Santini V, Wintermark M, Butts Pauly K, Ghanouni P. Transcranial MRI-guided high-intensity focused ultrasound for treatment of essential tremor: A pilot study on the correlation between lesion size, lesion location, thermal dose, and clinical outcome. Journal of magnetic resonance imaging: JMRI. 2017 PMID: 29076274

  7. Elias WJ, Lipsman N, Ondo WG, Ghanouni P, Kim YG, Lee W, Schwartz M, Hynynen K, Lozano AM, Shah BB, Huss D, Dallapiazza RF, Gwinn R, Witt J, Ro S, Eisenberg HM, Fishman PS, Gandhi D, Halpern CH, Chuang R, Butts Pauly K, Tierney TS, Hayes MT, Cosgrove GR, Yamaguchi T, Abe K, Taira T, Chang JW. A randomized trial of focused ultrasound thalamotomy for essential tremor. N Engl J Med. 2016 Aug 25;375(8):730-9. PMID: 27557301