Professor Stephen McDonnell

Stephen McDonnell is an academic orthopaedic surgeon within the Department of Surgery at the University of Cambridge and an Honorary Consultant Knee Surgeon at Addenbrookes. His research focuses on knee injuries, early knee osteoarthritis (OA), and the development of personalised treatments and patient stratification using novel imaging techniques, including the Cambridge Knee Injury Toolkit (CamKIT). He has conducted key trials such as the EU ADIPOA2 Study on stem cell therapy for early osteoarthritis and led the NIHR ACL STARR trial comparing ACL repair with reconstruction. 

He was born and raised in London, subsequently undertaking medical training at University College London (UCL). Having decided to specialise in trauma and orthopaedics, he embarked on orthopaedic surgery training and research at the Nuffield Orthopaedic Centre in Oxford and internationally with The Melbourne Orthopaedic Group in Australia. He undertakes a global collaboration with the orthopaedic surgeons in Blantyre, Malawi, through Cambridge Global Health Partnerships.

He is the Undergraduate Specialty Lead for Trauma and Orthopaedics, earning the 2022 Pilkington Prize for Teaching Excellence. During the COVID-19 pandemic, he transitioned surgical teaching to virtual platforms to maintain student engagement. He is also a post-chair of the Cambridge Surgical Forum.