2025 Speakers

OUR KEYNOTE SPEAKERS

Peter Goadsby, FMedSci, FRS

Director, NIHR King’s Clinical Research Facility

Peter Goadsby obtained his medical degree and training at the University of New South Wales (UNSW), Australia. Neurology training was with James W. Lance and clinical neurophysiology with David Burke. After post-doctoral work in New York with Don Reis at Cornell, Jacques Seylaz at Universite VII, Paris, and post-graduate neurology training at Queen Square, London with C David Marsden, Andrew Lees, Anita Harding and W Ian McDonald, he returned to UNSW, and the Prince of Wales Hospital, Sydney as a consultant neurologist and became an Associate Professor of Neurology. He was appointed a Wellcome Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Neurology, University College London in 1995. He was Professor of Clinical Neurology and Honorary Consultant Neurologist at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, Queen Square, London until 2007.

He has been Professor of Neurology, Department of Neurology, University of California, San Francisco since 2007. He has been an Honorary Consultant Neurologist at the Hospital for Sick Children, Great Ormond St, London since 1998.

In 2013 he was appointed Director, NIHR-Wellcome Trust King’s Clinical Research Facility, King’s College Hospital, Professor of Neurology at King’s College London and Honorary Consultant Neurologist, King’s College Hospital.

His major research interests are in the basic mechanisms of primary headache disorders, such as migraine and cluster headache, in both experimental and clinical settings, and translating these insights into better management.

Don’t miss the keynote presentation at 8:00 AM on April 4th in Salon C “Bench to Bedside—New Understanding and Better Treatment for Migraine,” highlighting advances in migraine pathophysiology and therapies.

Stephen G. Waxman, MD, PhD

Bridget Flaherty Professor of Neurology, Neuroscience and Pharmacology at Yale University

Stephen Waxman is the Bridget Flaherty Professor of Neurology, Neuroscience and Pharmacology at Yale University, where he served as Chairman of Neurology from 1986 until 2009. He founded and directs Yale’s Neuroscience & Regeneration Research Center. Prior to Yale, he held faculty positions at Harvard, MIT, and Stanford.

Dr. Waxman’s research capitalizes on the “molecular revolution” to develop new therapies that restore function after nervous system injury. He has published more than 800 scientific papers. His H-index is 126 and his papers have been cited more than 60,000 times.

Dr. Waxman’s first paper in Nature was published in 1970. His subsequent papers in Science, PNAS and Nature defined the ion channel architecture of nerve fibers, and demonstrated its importance for axonal conduction. He discovered the sodium channel plasticity that supports recovery of impulse conduction in demyelinated axons, both in animal models and within the human CNS in MS. Using molecular genetics, molecular biology, and biophysics, he made a molecule-to-man translational leap from laboratory to humans that uncovered the role of ion channels in human pain. He then led an international team that identified sodium channel mutations as causes of peripheral neuropathy. He has used atomic-level modeling to advance pharmacogenomics in a study, accompanied by a JAMA editorial stating “there are few examples in clinical medicine where molecular reasoning has been rewarded with comparable success”. A new class of non-addictive pain medications, based largely on his work as described in NEJM and the New York Times, is in Phase II/III clinical trials. He is now pinpointing “pain resilience” genes. His latest study in Nature characterizes an ion channel that controls joint degeneration in osteoarthritis.

Waxman has authored Spinal Cord Compression and Clinical Neuroanatomy (translated into 8 languages). He has served on multiple editorial boards including Annals of Neurology, Brain, Journal of Physiology, Trends in Molecular Medicine, and Nature Reviews Neurology. He is the Editor of The Neuroscientist. His trainees lead research teams throughout the world.

Dr. Waxman is a member of the National Academy of Medicine, and served on the Board of Scientific Counselors of NINDS. His honors include the Dystel Prize and Wartenberg Award (Amer. Acad. of Neurology), the Middleton Award and Magnuson Award (Veterans Admin), and the Soriano Award (Amer. Neurol. Assn). He was honored with the British Physiological Society’s Annual Prize, an accolade he shares with his heroes Nobel Prize laureates Andrew Huxley, John Eccles, and Alan Hodgkin. Most recently, he received the Mitchell Max Award (Amer. Acad. of Neurology), and the Julius Axelrod Prize (Society for Neuroscience).

Don’t miss the keynote presentation at 1:30 PM on April 5th in Salon C “Huxley’s Science Fiction: Ion Channels in Pain, Pain Resilience and Beyond,” exploring molecular mechanisms of pain and non-addictive treatments.

FEATURED SPEAKER

Maia Szalavitz

New York Times Bestselling Author and Opinion Writer

Maia Szalavitz is the author, most recently, of Undoing Drugs:  How Harm Reduction is Changing the Future of Drugs and Addiction, which is the first history of harm reduction in drug policy.

 

Her New York Times bestseller, Unbroken Brain: A Revolutionary New Way of Understanding Addiction wove together neuroscience and social science with her personal experience of addiction.  It won the 2018 media award from the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

She is a contributing opinion writer for the New York Times and has written for numerous publications including TIME, Wired, the Nation, Vice and Scientific American.

Her 2006 book, Help at Any Cost: How the Troubled Teen Industry Cons Parents and Hurts Kids, was the first to expose the damage caused by “tough love” youth treatment and helped spur Congressional hearings.

She has also authored or co-authored five other books, including the classic on child trauma, The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog, with Dr. Bruce D. Perry.  With Dr. Perry, she has also written Born for Love:  Why Empathy Is Essential— And Endangered, which laid out why empathy is essential for social trust and how inequality can erode it.  With Dr. Joseph Volpicelli, she wrote Recovery Options:  The Complete Guide, the first evidence-based guide to addiction treatment.

She lives with her husband and two squeaky cats in New York City.

Twitter:  @maiasz

SCHEDULED SPEAKERS

ANUJ

AGGARWAL, MD

JEREMY

ADLER, PA-C

CHARLES

ARGOFF, MD

FARSHAD AHADIAN, MD

ANTJE

BARREVELD, MD

MEREDITH

BARAD, MD

DANIEL

BARRON, MD, PHD

ALEXANDER
BAUTISTA, MD

DOUGLAS

BEALL, MD

BARLAS

BENKLI, MD

CAITLYN

BENTON

JEFFERY

BETTINGER, PHARMD

MAROM

BIKSON, PHD

SERGEY BORODIANSKI, MD

AMBER

BORUCKI, MD

TYLER BEST, PHD

ANDREA CHADWICK, MD

ANDREW

CHANG, MD, MD

GRANT

CHEN, MD

QILIANG

CHEN, MD, PHD

JIANGUO

CHENG, MD PHD

PAUL

CHRISTO, MD, MBA

HANCE CLARK, MD, PHD, FRCPC

CHRISTIE COX

STEVEN

COHEN, MD

DAVID

COPENHAVER,MD, MPH

RENA “LIZ” COURTNEY, PHD

RYAN

D’SOUZA, MD

BETH

DARNALL, PHD

ELISE

DE, MD

PAUL

DEJULIO, MD

CHARLES

DEMESA, DO

TANIA

DI RENNA, MD

COLLIN

DUFFY, PA-C

SHRAVANI

DURBHAKULA, MD, MPH, MBA

TRENT

EMERICK, MD, MBA

KIM

FISCHER, MD

SCOTT

FISHMAN, MD

TIM

FURNISH, MD

CHRISTOPHER

GHARIBO, MD

JATINDER

GILL, MD

ABHISHEK

GOWDA, MD

JODY

GREEN, CSO

AMIT

GULATI, MD

JONATHAN

HAGEDORN, MD

JENNIFER

 HAH, MD

MARIE

HANNA, MD

JHANVI

HEMANI, MD, DNB

BETH

HOGANS, MD, MD, PHD

COREY

HUNTER, MD, FIPP

ROBERT

HURLEY, MD, PHD

ZOHRA

HUSSAINI, MSN, FNC-BC, MB

KELLIE

JAREMKO, MD, PHD

DAVID JEVOTOVSKY, MD

XAVIER

JIMENEZ, MD

MING-CHIH

KAO, MD, PHD

MICHAEL

KAPLAN, MD

OLGA

KCIUK, MD

ANJALI

KOKA, MD

JENNIFER

KURZ, MD

GEMAYEL

LEE, MD

JOHN

LEE, MD

MICHAEL S.

LEONG, MD

PAUL

LYNCH, MD

KRISTEN MACKENZIE, MD

SEAN

MACKEY, MD, PHD

THERESA MALLICK-SEARLE, MS, PMGT-BC, ANP-BC

NORMAN

MARCUS, MD

ARAM MARDIAN, PHD

BRYAN MAYRSOHN, MD, MS

ARYA

MOHABBAT, MD

BRIDGET

MUELLER, MD, PHD

ANDREA MURPHY, MSN, APRN, ANP-BC, NEA-BC

SRINIVAS NALAMACHU, MD

NATHAN

NEUFELD, DO

CHARLES ODONKOR, MD

UZONDO OSUAGWU, MD

JOSH

PERESE, MD

SUDHEER POTRU, DO, FASA, FASAM

HEATHER POUPORE-KING, PHD

RASHMI

PRASAD, MD

SCOTT G. PRITZLAFF, MD

PRIYA

RATHI, MD

HASSAN

RAYAZ, MD

JOHN

SACK, PHD

ADEOLA SADIK, MD

CHINAR

SANGHVI, MD

NATHANIEL SCHUSTER, MD

KARA

SEGNA, MD

ANN

SHAH, MD

BETH

SHELLY, DPT

PRASAD SHRIVALKANAR, MD, PHD

NAILESHNI

SINGH, MD

KRISTEN

SLATER, PSYD

TRACI

SPEED, MD, PHD

STEVE

STANOS, DO

CINDY

STEINBERG

M. CHRISTINE STOCK, MD

DREW

STURGEON, PHD

SHELLEY

SU, PHD

VARSHA SURYAVANSHI, MD

ALEXANDRA SZABOVA, MD

ZEESHAN TAYEB, MD, DABPM, DABPRM

AMIR SOHEIL TOLEBEYAN, MD

IRWIN TRAN, PHARMD

LAKSHMI

VAS, MS

JULIO

VEGA, MD

KEVIN VORENKAMP, MD

RORY

VU MATHER

SAYED

WAHEZI, MD

LYNN

WEBSTER

ERICA

WEGRZYN, PHARMD

FRANK

WILLARD, PHD

JIJUN

XU, MD, PHD

KEVIN

ZACHAROFF, MD

FADAL

ZEIDAN, PHD

AMANDA ZIMMERMAN, PA-C