John J. "Buddy" Connors, MD, is an international leader and pioneer in the field of interventional neuroradiology. He received his undergraduate education at Vanderbilt University in Chemical Engineering. His medical school education and radiology residency were both at the University of Mississippi Medical Center where he became co-director of Interventional Radiology.

After completing his fellowship in Interventional Neuroradiology at the Semmes-Murphy/Baptist Hospital in Memphis, Tenn., he became director of Interventional Neuroradiology at Louisiana State Medical Center in New Orleans.

During his five years at LSU he completed his textbook Interventional Neuroradiology: Strategies and Practical Techniques, the only text in the world describing interventional stroke therapy and the first to incorporate description of cerebral protection for carotid stenting. In addition to endovascular therapy of intracerebral aneurysms, he has specific expertise in procedures such as intracerebral intra-arterial fibrinolysis for emergency stroke therapy and intracranial angioplasty and stenting. In addition to having published the largest series of intracranial angioplasties in the world, he has also personally performed more intracranial angioplasties for atherosclerotic stenosis than anyone in the world.

He is on the Board of Directors for the International Society of Cardiovascular Interventionists, and has been the secretary and the treasurer for the American Society of Interventional and Therapeutic Neuroradiology (ASITN). He was the course director of the first and only interventional stroke therapy training course in the world, held in Washington, D.C., in Oct. 2000. He is the Chair of the Ad hoc Committee on Carotid Angioplasty and Stenting of the ASITN.

He is the intersociety liaison for the ASITN and the Society of Cardiovascular and Interventional Radiology (SCVIR), and has coordinated all neurointerventional courses and stroke workshops for the SCVIR for the last 3 years. He is on the Program Committee for the American Society of neuroradiology (ASNR), the ASITN, and the SCVIR, the stroke task force for the ASNR, The Clinical Practice Committee for the ASNR, the Rules committee for the ASITN, the Standards of Practice Committee for the ASNR, and is the Chair of the Billing and Coding committee for the ASITN and the Chair of the FDA advisory board of the ASNR.

He is currently Vice President of the ASITN, and will be president in 2 years.

Dr. Connors has formed the only interventional stroke registry in the world as well as the only intracranial angioplasty/stenting registry in the world and is the Director and Chief Executive Officer of the Neurovascular Research Foundation. He is the director of the division of Interventional Neuroradiology at INOVA Fairfax Hospital in Falls Church, VA.