Stefan Friedrichsdorf is the medical director of the Center of Pain Medicine, Palliative Care and Integrative Medicine at the UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospitals in Oakland and San Francisco – one of the most comprehensive programs of its kind in the country.

The interdisciplinary pain program is devoted to prevent and treat acute, procedural, neuropathic, total, visceral, and chronic pain for pediatric patients in close collaboration with all clinicians and subspecialties at the Benioff Children’s Hospitals. The palliative care team provides holistic care for pediatric patients with life-limiting diseases and adds an extra layer of support to the care of children with serious illness and their families. Integrative Medicine provides and teaches safe evidence-based integrative therapies (such as massage, acupuncture/acupressure, biofeedback, aromatherapy, self-hypnosis) to provide care that promotes optimal health and supports the highest level of functioning in all individual child's activities. In 2020 the Benioff Children’s Hospital San Francisco received the prestigious ChildKind International pain relief certification and the Joint Commission Palliative Care Certification.

Dr. Friedrichsdorf received the 2016 “Elizabeth Narcessian Award for Outstanding Educational Achievements in the Field of Pain” by the American Pain Society and the 2011 “Hastings Center Cunniff-Dixon Physician Award”. He was the medical director of the department of pain medicine, palliative care & integrative medicine at Children’s Minnesota from 2005-2020 and under his leadership the department grew into one of the largest and most comprehensive in the country. It received the “Circle of Life Award” by the American Hospital Association in 2008 and was the 2013 recipient of the “Clinical Centers of Excellence in Pain Management Award” by the American Pain Society. and in 2018 the Albert Bandura Influencer Award from VitalSmarts.

He was the associate editor of the Journal of Pain and Symptom Management until 2020, the principal investigator of a National Institutes of Health (NIH) / National Cancer Institute (NCI) multisite study on the creation, implementation and evaluation of the Pediatric Palliative Care Curriculum “Education in Palliative and End-of-Life Care (EPEC)-Pediatrics”, which so far trained >1,100 clinicians from 86 countries. In 2008 he founded and since then directs the annual Pediatric Pain Master Class, a unique week-long intensive course for interdisciplinary health professionals, which trained more than 600 clinicians from 40 countries.

Dr. Friedrichsdorf has presented more than 750 lectures about pediatric pain medicine, palliative care and integrative medicine in 30 countries on all six continents and has a track record of research and publications in the field, including more than 60 peer-reviewed articles and contributions to more than 25 books on the subject. He is president-elect of the Special Interest Group on Pain in Childhood of the International Association for the Study of Pain (IASP).

Dr. Friedrichsdorf received his MD degree from the Medical University of Lübeck, Germany, completed his pediatric residency at the University of Witten/Herdecke, Germany (Children’s Hospital Datteln), and undertook his fellowship in Pediatric Pain Medicine and Palliative Care at the University of Sydney, Australia (Children's Hospital at Westmead). He is double boarded in Pediatrics in Germany and the United States, a Diplomate of the American Board of Pediatrics, and trained in pediatric clinical hypnosis.