Christopher Van Tilburg is an American physician and author specializing in emergency, wilderness, travel, environmental, occupational, and public health medicine. He is author of 11 books on outdoor recreation, wilderness medicine, and international travel, including two memoirs on mountain rescue Mountain Rescue Doctor: Wilderness Medicine in the Extremes of Nature and Search and Rescue: A Wilderness Doctor's Life-and-Death Tales of Risk and Reward.

Proudly South African, Ross was born and educated at the continent’s tip in Cape Town.  An avid outdoorsman with more than 20 years backcountry and mountaineering experience, Ross is most in his element in the rugged Cape Mountains, but a passion for adventure in wild places combined with his love of challenges has taken him from baking deserts to mountain peaks and frigid icecaps.  
 
Since qualifying from the University of Stellenbosch, his professional fields of interest have centred upon acute and critical care, trauma, anaesthesia, aeromedical, emergency and wilderness medicine.  He is a long-serving member of the mountain rescue team, Divemaster, and volunteer flight doctor for the Red Cross Air Mercy Service.  Ross has expedition experience from around the world, including serving as doctor and overwintering Expedition Leader for the South African National Antarctic Expedition.