Hernan Bazan, MD DFSVS FACS, is the CEO and Co-founder of South Rampart Pharma, Inc. He is spearheading the scientific and clinical development and fundraising of South Rampart Pharma and technology development efforts. As an academic vascular surgeon, he is the John Ochsner Endowed Professor of Surgery in Innovation. His clinical interests include treating carotid artery disease and acute stroke, using minimally invasive approaches to aortic aneurysms and peripheral arterial disease, and managing acute post-operative pain. Over the years, Dr. Hernan Bazan has realized the significant clinical and societal need for safer and non-addictive pain relief in ambulatory and post-operative settings. From these critical unmet needs, South Rampart Pharma, Inc. was founded in 2016 to develop safer, non-opioid therapies for acute and chronic pain. Dr. Hernan Bazan authored the first manuscript describing the library of analgesic compounds’ synthesis, lack of hepatoxicity analgesic characterization, and antipyretic properties, published in September 2020 in the European Journal of Medicinal Chemistry and a current paper under advanced review (open access) in Nature Communications. He is the PI or Co-I on two NIH/NINDS STTR (small business commercialization) grants to develop a novel non-narcotic and non-toxic analgesic to safely treat acute, chronic, and neuropathic pain. He is the co-inventor of 7 issued or pending patents and has authored over 50 publications. He and his team have completed Phase 1 clinical trials, paving the way for Phase 2 RCTs in acute and neuropathic pain. He was bestowed the 2024 NIH HEAL Director’s Trailblazer Award for this work. Dr. Hernan Bazan received a B.S.-Molecular Biology (Vanderbilt University, and spent two years as a Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Research Scholar at the NIH. He earned an M.D. (Georgetown University), followed by a General Surgery Residency (Mt. Sinai Hospital, New York) and a Vascular Surgery Fellowship (Yale University).