Speaker focus

Hôpital St Louis - Hôpitaux de Paris

Pr. François Desgrandchamps, MD-PhD

Urologue

Professor Desgrandchamps was born in 1960. He was a resident at the hospitals of Paris, won the Gold Medal for Surgery in 1990, and was appointed professor of urology at the University of Paris 7 (now the University of Paris-Cité), where he has been teaching since 2000.

He was promoted to the 2nd step of the exceptional class in 2023.

He has been head of the urology department at the Saint Louis Hospital, Assistance-Publique, Hôpitaux de Paris (APHP) since 2007.

Professor Desgrandchamps was an auditor at the Institut des Hautes Etudes de la Défense Nationale (IHEDN). 64th national ‘Defence Policy’ session in 2011-2012, and in view of his commitment to public service, he was promoted to the rank of Knight of the Order of the Legion of Honour, on behalf of the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health on 29 March 2013.

He has been a member of the National Academy of Surgery and a legal expert at the Paris Court of Appeal since 2022.

Deputy Director of the Haemato-Immunology Research Department (SRHI) of the CEA since 2023, he received the APinnov Promising Patent Award in 2017 for his work in the immunology of bladder cancer, and was honoured with the Doctoral and Research Supervision Award (PEDR) in 2018.

Previously, his research into biomaterials had enabled him to develop an artificial ureter, patented with the APHP, which is currently used worldwide.
He is the author and co-author of 202 international scientific publications.

At the same time, in addition to his university teaching, Prof F Desgrandchamps has been involved in continuing medical education and public education for many years: he has been the editor-in-chief of the Encyclopédie Médico-Chirurgicale en Urologie for over twenty years, and for over ten years he has been producing a monthly scientific bibliography journal for all urologists in France. In 2013, he received the 1st Editorial Prize in the training article – general medicine category from the Health Professions Press and Publishing Union.

For his commitment to teaching, he was promoted to Knight of the Order of Academic Palms in 2025.

Professor Desgrandchamps has written three books for the general public on prostate diseases, the latest of which, ‘La prostate on en parle’, published by Hachette in 2018, was nominated for the Académie des Sciences prize and is now available in paperback and has been translated into several languages.

He created a giant inflatable prostate, which, for more than five years, has been permanently touring France at the request of French urologists who use it in events to raise public awareness of prostate diseases.

A regular guest in the media, Professor Desgrandchamps received the Jean Bernard Prize from the Foundation for Medical Research in 2020 for his work in communicating with the general public.

Finally, his curriculum vitae shows that he is the author of four cookbooks, published by La Martinière between 2007 and 2015 (Littérature et Gourmandise: les plus belles recettes de la littérature française, Lettres gourmandes des terres lointaines et d’outre-mer, Cuisine à bord, and Compostelle, les recettes du chemin), which are an expression of his humanism.

Pr. François Desgrandchamps, MD-PhD will talk about: