Samir Taneja, MD

My interest in medicine began in the fifth grade. My mother had a master’s degree in public health and I would read over her shoulder, fascinated by her anatomy books. It was then that I decided I wanted to be a surgeon.

A few years later, I learned about an early acceptance program offered by Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine. I was accepted into the program in my senior year of high school and entered medical school after two years of college. I initially pursued neurosurgery, but a friend recommended urology. I liked the people in the field and was fascinated by the interaction of hormones and cancer within the prostate. I was fortunate to be allowed to conduct independent research in the department’s famous prostate cancer research laboratories and to have a world-renowned surgeon as my mentor, and so the course of my career as a surgeon in prostate cancer care and research was set.

When I first joined NYU Langone I focused broadly on urologic oncology, treating people with cancers of the prostate, kidney, bladder, and testis. Now, about 70 percent of my practice focuses on prostate cancer or the suspicion of prostate cancer.

The work I have been able to conduct at NYU Langone and its Perlmutter Cancer Center and Smilow Comprehensive Prostate Cancer Center has transformed the field of prostate cancer diagnosis and treatment by improving methods of prostate imaging, cancer detection, and disease localization. I strive to integrate new technologies into my practice to evolve the practice of oncology. This has allowed me to care for prostate cancer patients individually by avoiding surgery or radiation when not needed, and using new targeted approaches to treat the disease when possible. When conventional surgery is necessary, more than 90 percent of the surgical procedures I now perform are done laparoscopically with robotic assistance. This allows my patients to avoid large, open incisions, experience less pain and discomfort, and recover more quickly.

My clinical research focuses on the use of imaging to detect and treat prostate cancer. I pioneered the use of MRI to diagnose and pinpoint prostate cancer, and in MRI-guided focal ablative therapies that aim to destroy only the cancerous portion of the prostate. With the ability to precisely locate the cancer, patients no longer need to have the entire gland removed. Through ongoing improvements in imaging and constant integration of new technologies, we continue to evolve this approach to minimize the trauma of prostate cancer surgery.

I have authored more than 200 articles, 30 book chapters, and 6 textbooks and monographs on urologic cancer and surgery. In addition, I am the editor of Taneja’s Complications of Urologic Surgery: Prevention and Diagnosis, one of the most widely read textbooks in American urology.