Samir Mardini M.D. | Source

Dr. Mardini is a plastic surgeon and global leader in the field of craniofacial surgery and facial paralysis and reanimation surgery in children and adults. Dr. Mardini was a major contributor to forming Mayo Clinic's groundbreaking face transplant program, and he led his team to perform Mayo Clinic's first-ever face transplant successfully. This groundbreaking procedure gave a new life to a patient whose facial disfigurement destroyed his face and his life. As the Chair of the Division of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, Dr. Mardini tirelessly works to support and lead his team of fourteen plastic surgeons and hundreds of providers and Allied Health staff to exceptionally care for patients, innovate, and educate. He spent years traveling around the world, developing his knowledge, skills, and expertise to help people of all ages regain confidence and improved function after suffering from facial paralysis, disfigurement, or deformities. His practice focuses on the whole person, and he regularly collaborates with physicians across specialties to provide holistic, respectful, and attentive care to their individual health needs and aesthetic preferences.

Dr. Mardini completed his plastic surgery residency at Georgetown University in Washington, DC, followed by a one-year craniofacial fellowship and a two-year reconstructive microsurgery fellowship at Chang Gung Memorial Hospital in Taiwan. He then spent two more years as an academic surgeon in Taiwan before joining the Plastic Surgery division at Mayo Clinic.

Dr. Mardini's passion for helping others and extensive background and training at leading centers around the world reflect his relentless spirit of collaboration, knowledge-seeking, and mastery. His specialty in craniofacial surgery in children and adults includes helping those needing cleft lip and palate repair and those with craniosynostosis, vascular malformations, jaw malformations, congenital nevi, and facial injuries. He has a particular passion for improving the lives of patients with facial paralysis and synkinesis. He spent years perfecting his techniques in facial aesthetic surgery to restore function, symmetry, and a natural aesthetic appearance for people with facial deformities and facial paralysis.

Dr. Mardini is leading innovative breakthroughs in research centered around the facial nerve, facial allotransplantation, facial anatomy, regenerative medicine, cleft and craniofacial diseases, 3D imaging, and virtual surgery planning. As an active teacher and mentor, he has edited six peer-reviewed journals, published over one hundred and ninety peer-reviewed articles, over thirty book chapters, and four books, including a children's book on facial differences. Dr. Mardini was the Program Director for the Plastic Surgery Residency for eight years before assuming the role of Chair, and during that time, established the first Integrated Plastic Surgery Residency, which successfully advances four resident graduates per year. He has won Teacher of the Year for Plastic Surgery two years in a row and Teacher of the Year for Surgery and Surgical Sub-Specialties at the Mayo Clinic School of Graduate Medical Education.

Dr. Mardini is grateful for his participation in over thirty volunteer mission trips worldwide, helping children in need. During these trips, he and his team performed surgery for over 700 patients with cleft and craniofacial deformities and other facial differences. The story of the first Mayo Clinic face transplant performed by Dr. Mardini is told in Face in the Mirror: A Surgeon, a Patient, and the Remarkable Story of the First Face Transplant at Mayo (Mayo 20, 2025, Mayo Clinic Press, $28.99).