Luigi Festi

Dr. Luigi Festi is an emergency surgeon and Head of the Emergency Department at IRCCS Ospedale Galeazzi Sant’Ambrogio in Milan.

He carried out his hospital career at Ospedale di Circolo and subsequently at the University Hospital of Varese, where he served as assistant medical officer in surgery until 1992 and, from 1993, as senior assistant in General Surgery.

During his professional activity, he developed extensive experience in general, thoracic, and vascular surgery, participating in numerous courses in minimally invasive surgery and trauma care. In the last 10–15 years, he has also served as a lecturer in these courses. In the thoracic field, he held the role of deputy head physician for 16 years and, starting from 2002, he also served for many years as deputy head physician in the General and Vascular Surgery Units.

In the last five years of his hospital career, he worked as deputy head physician in the Emergency Surgery and Transplant Unit, serving as Head of the Trauma Team, concluding his hospital activity in 2024.

Since 2003, he has been a member of the Ethics Committee of the University of Insubria, where he served as Vice-President from 2017 to 2023. From 2012 to 2023, he was also Head of the Italian-Swiss cross-border center for the treatment of patients with accidental hypothermia.

In 2012, he founded at the University of Insubria the second-level university Master’s degree in Mountain Medicine, initially as a hospital surgeon. In 2015, the program became the Master in Mountain Emergency Medicine, becoming the only international academic course specifically dedicated to this field. As a recognized expert, Dr. Festi is now an international reference for training and for diseases related to high altitude and hypothermia.

He is the first author of the volume “Mountain Emergency Medicine”, published by EDRA in 2021. Throughout his long hospital and academic career, he has authored more than 100 scientific publications in the fields of surgical nutrition, sepsis, minimally invasive surgery, abdominal, thoracic and vascular oncologic surgery, and mountain medicine.

He has also organized numerous training courses and international congresses, including the most recent Forum on Rescue in Difficult Environment, held in Genoa in March 2025, which brought together over 130 speakers from around the world.