Dr. Ogan Gurel is Chairman of the Aesis Group, LLC which provides strategic and international marketing, market forecasting, technology assessment and investment research services to companies and investment firms in the life sciences and healthcare sectors. A wide variety of corporate and investment clients have been served including startups, hospitals, health systems, GPOs, private equity firms, venture capital funds and hedge funds. Presently, Dr. Gurel is also a columnist in biopharma/medtech for several online venues and a juror for the 2007 Medical Design Excellence Awards.
Previously Dr. Gurel was Chief Executive Officer at Duravest, Inc. – a publicly traded holding company which is a global leader in convergent medical technologies. At that time he also served as a Director on the Boards of Estracure, Inc – a Montreal-based next generation coronary stent company and BMTS, Inc. – a Munich-based orthopedic injury and pain management device company.
Prior to Duravest, Dr. Gurel was VP and Medical Director at Sg2, LLC– a leading healthcare intelligence think-tank and consultancy serving hospitals and health systems. As Medical Director, he led the research teams providing thought leadership on topics such as, Surgical Services, Cancer Care, Cardiovascular Services, ProcedureCenters, Imaging, Outpatient care, Neurosciences & Orthopedics, Payment & Finance, ICU, Emergency Departments, Hospital of the Future, Diabetes, and Asthma. Most notably, he was the principal architect and developer of the industry-leading Impact of Change™ healthcare utilization forecasting system based on a unique differential equation model integrating demographic, sociocultural, financial and technology drivers to predict change and also served as clinical lead for strategy consulting projects at hospitals nation-wide, supported marketing and business development (helping to drive sales from startup to nearly $12M in three years) and represented the company for any clinical-facing functions. Prior to Sg2, Dr. Gurel was at the blue-chip management consultancy Booz, Allen & Hamilton engaged in a number of strategy projects for Fortune 500 healthcare and life sciences clients. Dr. Gurel has also served as an independent consultant to several medical device firms in which he was specifically involved with European (EMEA) and FDA clinical trial development, monitoring and oversight.
Dr. Gurel also has deep experience in the basic biomedical sciences holding a B.A. cum laude in Biochemical Sciences from Harvard University after which he was a Visiting Researcher at the Institut Laue-Langevin in Grenoble, France. During this time he conducted NMR-based structural studies of DNA and neutron diffraction-based analyses of membrane protein structure. Dr. Gurel also holds an M.Phil. degree in Biochemistry & Molecular Biophysics from Columbia University where his research involved x-ray crystallographic structural studies of cytokines. His research has been published in the peer-reviewed scientific literature including the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO) Journal and the Journal of Molecular Biology and has also won honorable mention for the ACA Linus Pauling Prize. Additionally, Dr. Gurel have conducted research in computer science winning 3rd place in the national Westinghouse (now Intel) Science Talent Search for work related to microprocessor software development systems. Throughout his career, Dr. Gurel have taught a number of subjects - cellular and molecular biology, neuroanatohis, bioinformatics and mathematical modeling - at several universities including the Columbia University College of Physicians & Surgeons, Harvard Medical School and Roosevelt University and is presently Adjunct Associate Professor of Bioengineering at the University of Illinois - Chicago.
On the clinical side, Dr. Gurel received his M.D. with honors (Alpha Omega Alpha) from the Columbia University College of Physicians & Surgeons and completed surgical internship at the Massachusetts General Hospital with a joint appointment as Clinical Fellow in Surgery at the Harvard Medical School. Dr. Gurel is also experienced in international medical relief work both during the NATO military campaign in Kosovo as well as in Turkey after the massive 1999 earthquake. With an extensive background in international settings, Dr. Gurel is fluent in French, Turkish and German and has conversational ability in Russian.
As a healthcare technology expert and futurist, Dr. Gurel have been a frequent conference speaker worldwide, addressing the issue of emerging technologies and their impact on the future of healthcare with a particular focus has been on convergent medical technologies including medical nanotechnology. His commentaries have been published in prominent publications, including the Wall Street Journal and Dr. Gurel is a regular columnist for Midwestbusiness.com, the Midwest’s most prominent technology newsletter, where he provides insight into emerging medical technologies. Dr. Gurel is a President’s Circle member of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.