Edward R. Mariano, MD, MAS, FASA, FASRA is a graduate of Georgetown University School of Medicine. He completed his anesthesiology residency at Stanford University Medical Center and pediatric anesthesiology fellowship at Stanford’s Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital with a special interest in regional anesthesiology and acute pain medicine (RAAPM) for children. He is double board-certified by the American Board of Anesthesiology (Anesthesiology and Pediatric Anesthesiology) and is a Fellow of the American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) and Fellow of the American Society of Regional Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine (ASRA).
He joined the Department of Anesthesiology at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), in 2004, where he founded the RAAPM program. While working full-time, he also earned a Master of Advanced Studies degree in clinical research. He served as RAAPM Division Chief at UCSD until 2010, pioneering the use of continuous peripheral nerve blocks for patients having same-day surgery and founding the first one-year RAAPM Fellowship in California. From 2013 to 2016, Dr. Mariano took the lead in achieving accreditation status for all RAAPM fellowship programs nationwide through the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME), and the RAAPM fellowship program at Stanford that he directed was one of the first nine programs to become ACGME-accredited.
Dr. Mariano has volunteered his pediatric and regional anesthesiology services on multiple medical missions to the rural provinces of the Philippines and Ecuador and has brought residents and fellows with him to expand their training with exposure to global health and the disparities in pain management and surgical care in developing countries.
Dr. Mariano is a Professor and Vice Chair in the Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine at Stanford University School of Medicine and served as Director of the Stanford Regional Anesthesiology and Acute Pain Medicine Fellowship Program from 2016 to 2022. He was awarded Fellowship Director of the Year amongst all Stanford fellowship directors in 2021 and received the Distinguished Educator in Anesthesiology Award from ASA and the Society for Education in Anesthesia in 2024.
Dr. Mariano’s research interests include the development of techniques and patient care pathways to improve postoperative pain control and other outcomes, and he has published hundreds of research articles, book chapters, and invited reviews in this field with extramural grant funding from the Foundation for Anesthesia Education and Research, Department of Defense, and other agencies for related research. Dr. Mariano has been an invited keynote speaker at numerous national and international conferences, and he has received the Distinguished Service Award from ASRA and the Spanish Society of Regional Anesthesia and Pain Medicine.
He also serves as Chief of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine at the Veterans Affairs Palo Alto Health Care System and is a recipient of the Veterans Health Administration’s John D. Chase Award for Physician Executives Excellence. He has held leadership positions in the California Society of Anesthesiologists including President, ASRA, ASA, and major scientific journals in his specialty, including being the first Editor of Anaesthesia from the United States.
Dr. Mariano has worked on key national healthcare initiatives in the U.S. including the accreditation of regional anesthesiology and acute pain medicine fellowships, pain management guidelines and hospital-based standards, development of quality and cost measures in perioperative care, and the National Academy of Medicine Action Collaborative Countering the U.S. Opioid Epidemic.