Dr. Larson’s 2022 Message

I am Jeffrey Larson, a board-certified neurosurgeon with continuous Maintenance of Certification from the ABNS, now spanning 3 decades.  I graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.S. in Microbiology and then from Wayne State University with an M.S. in Molecular Genetics.  I received my medical degree from The University of Cincinnati, then completed residency training at the University of Cincinnati and the Mayfield Brain and Spine Clinic.  For the last 20 years I have practiced medicine and resided in and around Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, where I established my clinic, Coeur d’Alene Spine and Brain (CDA Spine).

I allocate my time across four primary activities, which reflect my professional passions.  First, the practice of general Neurosurgery including brain and spine surgery.  I have developed specialized minimally invasive outpatient spine surgical procedures for over twenty years now – from simple microsurgical decompressions to artificial disc replacement surgery and more rigorous multilevel cervical and lumbar reconstructions and fusions.  These efforts, combined with a superb, dedicated and like-minded staff have allowed CDA Spine and Brain to operate a world class outpatient Neurosurgery Clinic and ambulatory surgery center, coinciding with and responding to the imperatives of not only a rapid demographic growth in northern Idaho, but also a more mobile regional, national and global community willing to travel for their health care.  

My second passion is research- especially research supporting immediate and practical surgical innovations.  I have held grants from the American Cancer Society, I am an active contributor for peer review manuscripts; and I am an enthusiastic lecturer; and I am an especially proud author of numerous active patents and inventions in the systems and methods of spine surgery.

Third, service to the community, through a commitment to the on-call neurosurgery team at Kootenai Health, in the direct capacity of performing neurosurgical trauma surgery and other neurosurgical emergencies, and more indirectly by assisting and encouraging the development of regional medical resources and facilities to accommodate rapid growth in the demand for care.  I do this through my own patient care, as well as by teaching minimally invasive spine surgery techniques.  I hold site visits at my ambulatory surgery center to help other surgeons refine their minimally invasive surgery and outpatient spine surgery techniques.  I have also become interested in virtual media as an effective outreach and educational tool, and I have developed online teaching including instructional videos, live events, and a podcast in which I have been dubbed “The mind that diagnoses you and the hands that heal you”!

Fourth and finally, I am passionate in the pursuit of physical well-being, and better understanding the integrative aspects of brain/body well-being. This allows me to channel my competitive energies as a lifelong athlete with the intellectual curiosities of a doctor that appreciates how limited our understanding remains of the human brain and its full potential.  An illustration of this interest currently includes my latest project, a health optimization clinic curated to treat the whole body at the cellular level, including the brain and all other organ systems.