Dr Findlay was the first student to successfully complete the challenging parallel Bachelors of Medicine, Surgery and Science through the University of Queensland while simultaneously undertaking competitive scholarships in biomedical research centres at the Queensland Institute of Medical Research and the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute under the direction of esteemed supervisors such as Lasker medallist Professor Jacques Miller, combined with clinical observerships at leading clinical centres such as the University of California San Francisco Medical Centre. Following his basic Surgical Training, Dr Findlay established the Brisbane Basic Surgical Sciences course to help teach the surgical sciences to junior surgical trainees. Dr Findlay then spent 2 years on the Advanced General Surgery training program to broaden his surgical experience before undertaking his Plastic Surgery training on the accredited Plastic & Reconstructive Surgery Training Program of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons.

Dr Findlay conducted his early training in Plastic, Reconstructive, Aesthetic and Hand Surgery in Melbourne, where he simultaneously completed a PhD in Tissue Engineered Breast Reconstruction under the supervision of Professor Wayne Morrison on the Surgeon Scientist Program of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons with the support of National Health and Medical Research Council Scholarships. He received numerous local, national and international awards for his innovative research including the Young Investigator of the Year Award from the Surgical Research Society of Australasia and prizes for the best research papers for Victoria and Australasia for multiple years from the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons amongst many others. His research led to a patent to support the production of new tissues for reconstructive surgery and was hailed by the American Society of Plastic Surgeons as one of the most impactful research projects in the history of tissue engineering and regenerative medicine.

Dr Findlay then broadened his reconstructive experience by completing three years as a Microsurgery Fellow at St Vincent’s Hospital Melbourne and the Bernard O’Brien Institute of Microsurgery before undertaking an additional Fellowship at the Institute of Reconstructive Plastic Surgery at New York University Medical Center. Upon completion of his surgical training Dr Findlay worked at multiple public hospitals in Victoria including the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre where he worked alongside Dr Felix Behan to help revolutionise reconstruction for cancer and trauma patients through the development of new locoregional perforator flaps. He co-authored the definitive textbook on the Keystone and related perforator flap techniques and his clinical expertise in this area was recognised by the annual meeting of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons. During this time, Dr Findlay retained his active interest in academic plastic surgery by presenting dozens of clinical and basic science research papers at local, national and international meetings while undertaking multiple academic roles through the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, the University of Melbourne and Monash University as an Instructor for Surgeons as Educators and Surgeons as Teachers courses, Early Management of Severe Burns Course, as a co-ordinator of medical student training in surgery and as the Plastic Surgery Representative on the Victorian State Council for the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons.

Dr Findlay’s growing leadership in academic research and expertise in translational stem cell and tissue engineering research was recognised through the award of the prestigious Fulbright Scholarship in 2012. Dr Findlay used this to work and study at Stanford University where he was appointed as a Visiting Assistant Professor and the Inaugural Stanford Applied Regenerative Medicine Fellow. Dr Findlay undertook cutting edge stem cell research and ran clinical trials of stem cell therapies to treat unmet clinical needs in patients. He went on to become junior faculty at Stanford University as a Clinical Instructor, undertook additional training in Advanced Wound care and practiced as an Attending Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeon at Stanford University Medical Centre for a further 2 years. During this time, he was the first Australian to become appointed as a member of both the Association of Academic Surgeons and the esteemed Society of University Surgeons in the United States and became a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons in 2013.

His clinical and academic expertise is internationally recognized as evidenced by invited lectureships at numerous prestigious centres including the MD Anderson Cancer Center, Johns Hopkins Medical Center (and Johns Hopkins University), UCLA Medical Center, Stanford University Medical Center and the University of Washington Medical Center among others. His on-going translational stem cell and tissue engineering research received numerous awards including best research paper for Plastic Surgery from Stanford University Medical Center. He received the coveted Neil Hamilton-Fairley Clinical Overseas Research Scholarship from the National Health and Medical Research Council in 2013 and followed this with the prestigious D.W. Keir Fellowship in 2017.

Upon his return to Australia in 2016, he was appointed the Supervisor of Plastic Surgery Training at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre and at The Canberra Hospital. He continued his translational stem cell research in partnership with international collaborators and heads the Program for Cellular and Molecular Innovation in Surgery at the University of Melbourne where exciting laboratory research and new technological innovations are incorporated into clinical practice. Dr Findlay supports high impact, multi-centre international research as the Director of Australasian Clinical Trials in Plastic, Reconstructive and Aesthetic Surgery for the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons and as the Australasian Liaison to the Plastic Surgery Research Council (North America) and the European Plastic Surgery Research Council. Dr Findlay engages with both established and emerging Medical Technology companies to help bring new surgical treatments and devices into clinical practice as a consultant and as a member of Scientific Advisory Boards. Dr Findlay was the recipient of the Albert Nelson Marquis Lifetime Achievement Award in 2017 in recognition for his on-going contribution to clinical care and advancing surgical practice. In addition to his textbook, he has dozens of textbook chapters, over 30 peer-reviewed journal articles including high impact journals such as Nature Communications and hundreds of local, national and international presentations.