Christopher J. Moran, MD, a professor emeritus of radiology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, died Thursday, April 30, 2026, of cancer. He was 78.
Moran was a faculty member of WashU Medicine Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology (MIR) for 45 years, during which he became a pioneer in a life-saving technology to treat brain aneurysms. He retired from research and clinical practice in 2025.
Moran was born in Detroit in 1948. He earned his bachelor’s degree from the University of Notre Dame in 1970 and his MD from Saint Louis University School of Medicine in 1974. He completed both a residency in diagnostic radiology and a fellowship in neuroradiology in 1978 at MIR and joined the faculty as an assistant professor of radiology in the same year. He rose to full professor of radiology and of neurological surgery in 2003.
Moran was part of the Pipeline for Uncoilable or Failed Aneurysms study, published in 2013. This multicenter clinical trial proved the safety and efficacy of the pipeline embolization device to treat brain aneurysms — dangerous bulges in blood vessels that can rupture and cause a stroke. The device is inserted into the affected vessel to reduce internal pressure on the aneurysm and allow it to heal.
Moran became an expert on the clinical use of the pipeline embolization device and traveled around the world and across the U.S. as a procedure trainer and proctor, visiting more than 200 medical facilities.
As chair of MIR’s Continuous Quality Improvement Committee, Moran led an interdepartmental effort to reduce the time between a patient’s arrival in a medical facility and the start of an intervention. That success was recognized with the Team Award for Quality from Barnes-Jewish Hospital’s Endovascular Acute Stroke Committee in 2017.
Moran received additional awards and honors over the course of his career and was elected a fellow of the American Heart Association, the Society of NeuroInterventional Surgery and the American College of Radiology.
He is survived by his wife, Eleanor Moran; children John Moran (Molly), William Moran (Courtney) and Mary Catherine Moran; nine grandchildren; siblings Jeffrey Moran (Cindy), Susan Moran and Thomas Moran; and numerous nieces, nephews and in-laws.
Funeral services will be held at the Saint Louis Abbey Church, 500 S. Mason Road in Creve Coeur, Mo., at 11 a.m. Saturday, May 16. In lieu of flowers, the family requests Masses in his honor, memorial donations to the St. Louis Abbey or St. Louis Priory School or to the Detroit Catholic Central High School.
Read more about his life in the family obituary.