Compassionate Care

With Experience You Can Trust

Request Appointment

As Featured On

nbc-news
nass
acs
san-diego
oprah

Personalized Care At Its Best

At the office of Dr. Frank Coufal, we understand the toll severe pain and complex diagnoses can take on your quality of life.

Our mission is to provide you with empathetic, one-on-one attention in a caring, intimate setting. We listen to your concerns and work tirelessly to find the most appropriate treatment plan for you.

Our Practice Is Known For:

Personalized Neurosurgical Trauma and Emergency Care: Immediate attention when you need it most.

Elective Neurosurgical Services: Tailored solutions for your unique needs.

Compassionate Staff: A team that truly cares about your well-being.

What to Expect

Whether you’ve been recommended for a major surgery and seek a second opinion, or you are struggling in persistent pain with or without a clear diagnosis, Dr. Coufal and his experienced team are here to help.

Many of our patients come to us feeling unheard and uncertain. Our goal is to provide clear, timely responses and the reassurance you need as you approach your surgery date. We strive to improve your quality of life and, in many cases, increase longevity.

What Our Patients Say...

“From my first meeting with Dr. Coufal, I felt confident that he could help and he said he could. He is very knowledgeable and skilled. Although I am still in recovery stages, I can feel myself getting better every day. Because of Dr. Coufal and his staff, I feel hopeful again that I might have a more normal life, with less pain.”

— Tamara P.

“There are no words to express to you how grateful I am for giving back to me a quality life.

On April 13th, 2011 you performed my spinal surgery. I attribute my life without pain to your remarkable surgery. There are no words to express to you how grateful I am for giving back to me a quality life. Please accept this gift with my gratitude.”

— Beverly S.

You can play with your kids again…

“My name is Kylie Hill, I’m 10 years old, I’m Brendan Hill’s daughter. This last September you performed surgery on my Dads back. For as long as I can remember my dad had pain. He was limited on the activities he could do with us. It has been really hard on my brother Dominik and I, as well as my Dad. Since his surgery he taught us how to play golf, taught us how to go kayaking, taught us how to play volleyball, and taught me how to drive a golf cart. Thank you so much for fixing my Dads back.“

— Kylie H.

Areas Of Expertise

Get the Care You Deserve

Ready to take the next step towards a better life?

Call us today to schedule an appointment with Dr. Frank Coufal and experience the difference personalized neurosurgical care can make.
Call for Appointment

In The News

See More Media News

18TH CENTURY ANATOMIC ENGRAVINGS BY THE ITALIAN ANATOMIST, ALBINI

What is the role of the artist in the processes of discovery and scientific understanding in the field of medicine? The woodcuts and engravings by early European anatomists sought to expand comprehension of the human body and its functionality. Over time, the beautiful anatomic engravings, such as this one by Albini, gave way to more detailed interior discovery rendered by radiographs, and then CT and MRI imaging. Now, rather than beautiful anatomic drawings, we have computer-generated graphics where our bodies are interpreted through numbers and data sets. Digitizing this information essentially removes the hand of the artist/scientist.

CANTONESE (Primitive painting)

In our office, we have five paintings composed by anonymous Cantonese artists that depict the frenetic activity of daily human life. Not only do these paintings emphasize the full participation in the daily activities of living that we all strive to return to, but also the important interrelationship between all human beings, which certainly and importantly extends to the fields of healthcare. As these paintings line the entrance of the office, my hope has always been that they will immediately instill in new patients a desire to be fully rehabilitative and fully engaged back into the fabric of life as desired.

DAUM CRYSTAL-ABSTRACTED SKULL

There is an innate human desire to visualize the invisible which is, in the field of Neurosurgery, well-depicted by this beautiful, one of a kind crystal abstracted skull. It emphasizes that neuroscience is an inherently visual science, and modern imaging techniques are the culmination of a trajectory initiated by Golgi’s 1873 staining technique that first allowed us to see a human brain cell. What is beyond this, still, is the knowledge of what is the seat of human consciousness, as well as the mechanisms of the brain that govern emotions and mental illness. This still remains a great unknown, symbolized by the void within the abstracted skull.

MEET DR. FRANK COUFAL, FACS

Director of Neurotrauma at Scripps Memorial Hospital-La Jolla

Dr. Coufal is a proud native Texan, but has repeatedly over the course of his life been beckoned by the intellectual excitement and professional opportunities of California. His first experience of California occurred in the early 1980s when he attended college at Stanford University. In his words, those were “my best four years.” From 1980 to 1984, he completed a double major (B.A.S.) in biological sciences and history, graduating with departmental honors and with distinction in both major fields. His areas of principal focus in the history department included late antiquity, East Asian studies, and historiography. Through the Biology Department, he became inspired by the blossoming field of molecular oncology. Moreover, he had the unique opportunity to be mentored in his undergraduate research by the late Dr. Henry Kaplan – a pioneering radiation oncologist at Stanford Medical Center, who almost single-handedly led to the cure of Hodgkin’s disease. Indeed, Dr. Coufal’s early research at Stanford’s Cancer Biology Research Laboratory was to provide a foundation for further interest in the area of cancer treatment. 

Perhaps feeling somewhat nostalgic for his native Texas, Dr. Coufal then returned home and completed his medical school training at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School in Dallas. He was particularly proud of the opportunities afforded him at the renowned teaching facility, Parkland Memorial Hospital. The early “hands-on” approach to medical student education at Parkland in turn allowed more rapid acquisition of responsibility. It also provided his first exposure to the subspecialty of neurosurgery. He was particularly inspired by his clinical rotations with the renowned neurovascular specialist and Chief of Neurosurgery, Dr. Duke Samson – as well as the prominent pediatric neurosurgeon, Dr. Derek Bruce. Encouraged as well by his neuroanesthesiologist father, he then decided that neurosurgery would be his specialty.

This decision also had a special resonance within the Coufal family because Dr. Coufal’s paternal grandfather had suffered a traumatic brain injury while serving in France during the First World War and was providentially treated by the Father of Neurosurgery, Dr. Harvey Cushing. 

Before beginning clinical residency, Dr. Coufal chose to expand upon his earlier research interests and was awarded an NIH (National Institutes of Health) research training grant at the Neuropathology Research Laboratory and Brain Tumor Research Center of the University of California, San Francisco. 

Under the preceptorship of Doctors Stanley Prusiner and Stephen De’Armond, he investigated the molecular biology of human prion diseases and the potential role of a unique astrocyte growth factor in their pathologic expression. This research led to the publication of several seminal papers for which Dr. Prusiner was ultimately awarded the 1997 Nobel Prize in Medicine.

After the completion of his two-year research grant, Dr. Coufal then began his clinical neurosurgical residency at the University of California San Diego Medical Center. There, he developed his special interest in traumatic brain injury under the tutelage of his chairman, Dr. Lawrence Marshall. As a lead investigator for the National Traumatic Coma Data Bank and architect of San Diego’s Trauma System, Dr. Marshall brought important clinical trials to UCSD from which his residents greatly benefited. In addition to this interest in neurotraumatology, Dr. Coufal also continued his research interest in the molecular biology of brain tumors via an in-training research fellowship at La Jolla’s Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, under the guidance of its director, Dr. Webster Cavenee.

During residency, Dr. Coufal married Dr. Sandra Isern, who he had met while they were both medical students in Texas. While Dr. Frank Coufal was completing his eight-year residency, Dr. Sandra Coufal joined Scripps Clinic Medical Group, and ultimately became Division Head of Internal Medicine. She has since left Clinical Medicine to pursue Biotechnology. At present, she is CEO of Toragen, a company focused on the discovery and development of novel targeted molecular therapies for treating human papillomavirus-induced cancers. Before that, she served as a biomedical advisor for Novartis, and co-founded Ilypsa, Relypsa, and Tricida.

A special component of neurotraumatology that also intrigued Dr. Coufal during his residency years was the management of spinal trauma with spinal cord injury. For additional research work he performed in this area, he was awarded the 1996 Volvo Award for Spine Research. This interest also led him to pursue an extra year of fellowship training in complex spinal surgery once his residency came to conclusion. 

Dr. Coufal considers it a great honor to have been selected as one of Dr. Sanford Larson’s fellows at the Medical College of Wisconsin. Dr. Larson had been a pioneer in the development of spinal instrumentation for the reconstruction of complex traumatic spinal column injuries and unstable primary spinal column tumors. He also helped launch the integration of the science of spinal biomechanics with surgical treatment strategies. 

While at Wisconsin, Dr. Coufal published articles on the emerging spinal fusion devices, and gained tremendous insight during his research time at the Biomechanical Research Laboratory of the Milwaukee Veterans Administration Medical Center.

After completion of all residency and fellowship training, Dr. Coufal joined Midwest Neurosurgery Associates, a private practice group based in Kansas City with its own gamma knife unit, at that time serving a four-state region. This practice setting afforded not only vital experience in the expanding field of stereotactic radiosurgery, but a broad experience in all areas of neurosurgery. Dr. Coufal quickly became “board certified” by the American Board of Neurological Surgery in 2003, but then again was drawn back to California by professional opportunities for both he and his wife. 

Returning to Southern California in 2001, he has gone on to create La Jolla Neurosurgical Associates AMC. The practice is run through a new state-of-the-art central office on the Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla campus, adjacent to one of the hospitals where Dr. Coufal serves as medical director of Neurotrauma and Neurosurgical Emergency Services. His group, in fact, since 2004 has provided exclusive neurosurgical services for Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla, and has led the way in bringing new technology to bear for the treatment of traumatic brain injury, neurovascular disorders, brain tumors, and degenerative spinal disease. At the same time, Dr. Coufal has, since 2002, been a qualified medical examiner and independent medical examiner within a workman’s compensation referral network extending from Los Angeles and Orange Counties to San Diego. Dr. Coufal’s considerable exposure to both degenerative disc disorders of the spine and acute spinal trauma has also led to his becoming a consultant for several companies involved with spinal surgical instrumentation/device development. As such, he has lectured and instructed nationally as well as internationally on the new field of minimally invasive spinal surgical techniques. He has also participated, and continues to participate in important clinical trials of neurospinal devices such as the artificial disc. Finally, Dr. Coufal has been a lead neurosurgeon using the new CyberKnife units serving as the next generation stereotactic radiosurgical treatment for tumors and vascular lesions of the brain and spine. 

Dr. Coufal’s hospital affiliations in San Diego County are now exclusively within the Scripps Hospital system. As stated above, this began when he became medical director of Neurotrauma and Neurosurgical Emergency Services at Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla in 2004. He subsequently also became medical director of Neurotrauma and Neurosurgical Emergency Services at Scripps Mercy Hospital, serving in that capacity from 2016 until 2024. 

He also became the first medical co-director of the Comprehensive Stroke Center established at Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla and is an original and continuing member of the Neuroscience Steering Committee of the Scripps Hospital system. Within the Scripps Hospital system, Dr. Coufal performs surgeries at Scripps Memorial Hospital La Jolla, Scripps Memorial Hospital Encinitas, and Scripps Mercy Hospital.

Over the course of Dr. Coufal’s career, a number of his surgical outcomes have attracted national attention. To date, he has been featured with one of his patients on “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” as well as several Discovery Health Channel dramatic recreations of operations. 

In addition, some of his additional featured surgical cases have been presented on “The 700 Club,” and “The Montel Williams Show.” One of his cases was also publicized in a Good Housekeeping article, and he has been the subject of multiple segments/articles by local newspaper and television press. He also has been perennially featured in the San Diego Magazine Top Doctors issue under the listing of Neurological Surgery.