Elspeth Hill, MD, has been appointed director of peripheral nerve and brachial plexus surgery in the Department of Surgery at Yale School of Medicine.
Hill joined the Yale faculty in 2022 as an assistant professor of surgery and has since built a regional referral base for complex nerve care. She established the complex nerve multidisciplinary clinic and provides care in the pediatric brachial plexus clinic in collaboration with physiatry, orthopedic surgery and rehabilitation specialists. Her work includes nerve surgery to reconstruct paralyzed extremities in children, as well as innovative procedures such as nerve transfers and hyperselective denervation. In 2023, she performed Yale’s first nerve transfer to restore function in a spinal cord injury patient.
Most recently, Hill launched the Adult Spasticity Program, a collaboration with plastic surgery, hand therapy, orthopedic surgery and physiatry. The program serves patients in Connecticut with debilitating extremity palsy and spasticity and has introduced new nerve-based spasticity procedures to Yale.
Hill combines her clinical work with a strong research background. She holds a master’s degree in molecular biology, a PhD in surgical education and extensive clinical research training. Her scholarship aims to improve care for patients with complex nerve injuries.
Internationally trained, Hill earned her medical degree at the University of Manchester in the United Kingdom before completing a plastic surgery residency at Washington University in St. Louis, a leading center for nerve surgery. She went on to fellowships at the University of Oxford in extremity reconstruction, nerve and microsurgery, and in brachial plexus surgery with Jayme Bertelli, MD, PhD in Brazil. She later returned to Washington University for an orthopedic hand and microsurgery fellowship.