Our Mission: To offer exceptional multidisciplinary clinical care for children with neurological disease, provide outstanding educational opportunities, and foster research and scholarly activity.
In 2019, Dell Medical School and Dell Children’s Medical Center entered into a unique partnership to create a pediatric neuroscience program. This program combines pediatric neurology, pediatric neurosurgery, pediatric rehabilitation, pediatric neuro-ophthalmology, and pediatric neuropsychology. Our program’s physicians, advanced practice providers, and nurses care for children and adolescents with all neurological disorders. We support research and provide training for medical students as well as residents in child and adult neurology, pediatrics, psychiatry, and other disciplines. In 2024, our program was ranked one of the top neurology and neurosurgery programs by U.S. News and World Report.
Our program currently has 20 faculty child neurologists, three pediatric neurosurgeons, three pediatric physical medicine and rehabilitation specialists, a pediatric neuro-ophthalmologist, eight pediatric neuropsychologists, two genetic counselors, and 20 advanced practice providers. Additional faculty members are scheduled to begin in 2024 and 2025, and recruiting is ongoing.
We offer residency training in child neurology and fellowship opportunities in pediatric epilepsy, pediatric headache, and pediatric neuropsychology. Additional planned fellowship programs include pediatric physical medicine and rehabilitation, pediatric neuroimmunology, and pediatric neuromuscular disease.
To foster community and wellness within our team, our Pediatric Neurosciences Wellness Committee hosts events throughout the year, including our annual retreat.
Specialized Neuroscience Programs
UT Health Austin Pediatric Neurosciences at Dell Children’s hosts a number of subspecialty programs that offer clinical care and support clinical or basic research. A few of these programs are highlighted below.
Comprehensive Epilepsy Care
Our Comprehensive Pediatric Epilepsy Center is recognized as a Level 4 Epilepsy Center by the National Association of Epilepsy, a designation that signifies the highest standards for providing the most complex forms of intensive neurodiagnostic monitoring as well as more extensive medical, neuropsychological, and psychosocial treatment. Our center is the only dedicated pediatric epilepsy center in Central Texas, providing a broad range of age-appropriate medical, surgical, and dietary therapies. The multidisciplinary team includes board-certified and fellowship-trained pediatric epilepsy specialists, pediatric neurosurgeons, dietitians, neuropsychologists, and social workers. The epilepsy program supports specialized clinics such as the Genetic Epilepsy Clinic, the Infant Epilepsy Clinic, the Ketogenic Therapies Clinic, the New Onset Seizure Clinic, and the Surgical Epilepsy Clinic.
The epilepsy program supports an ACGME-approved epilepsy fellowship and an active epilepsy outreach program in Africa and the Caribbean. The group’s research interests include clinical trials of antiseizure medications, social conditions that adversely affect access to clinical care, and the use of magnetoencephalography to localize epileptiform discharges.
Pediatric Headache
The Pediatric Headache Center is the only multidisciplinary pediatric headache program in Central Texas that is equipped to address the full range of neurological, neuropsychological, and psychosocial problems in children and adolescents with headache disorders. We use up-to-date evidence-based research to identify the most appropriate treatment approach. Treatment options may include pharmaceutical intervention, psychological approaches such as cognitive behavioral therapy, physical therapy, or a combination of techniques that are designed to meet the child’s unique needs.
The Pediatric Headache Center supports a UCNS-approved pediatric headache fellowship. The faculty members participate in several randomized clinical trials in children with headache.
Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD)
The University of Texas at Austin and Dell Children’s have a robust history of ASD research and clinical care. Dell Children’s Medical Center has been providing clinical care for children with autism since its launch in 2007. Since then, the autism program has grown and matured, particularly with the clinical and research partnership established with Dell Medical School, which launched in 2013. The autism clinical care and research program were further bolstered by the establishment of UT Health Austin Pediatric Neurosciences at Dell Children’s to consolidate care for children with neurological conditions.
Autism research focused initially on fragile X syndrome, one of the more common genetic abnormalities in individuals with ASD. Starting in 2007, Dr. Kim Raab-Graham began studying how learning and memory relate to the mTOR pathway in fragile X syndrome. Drs. Dan Johnston and Darrin Brager later established that FMRP, the gene product of Fmr1, modifies neuronal excitability due to its effect on ion channel activity. Dr. Audrey Brumback’s laboratory built upon this work by identifying differences in ion channel activity in the thalamus. Dr. Nicholas Priebe’s laboratory is working to understanding how loss of Fmr1 function influences the development of the visual system. Dr. Laura Colgin’s laboratory is doing research to understand how loss of Fmr1 influences spatial navigation. Dr. Jon Pierce studies the molecular genetics of autism.
Neuromuscular Disorders
The Pediatric Neuromuscular Disease Center supports the diagnosis and management of children and adolescents with neuromuscular disorders, including inherited neuropathy, muscular dystrophy, and spinal muscular atrophy (SMA). We offer gene therapy for SMA and Duchenne muscular dystrophy and provide on-call support for newborns who screen positive for SMA. The program offers the region’s only MDA-affiliated muscular dystrophy clinic, staffed by neurologists, pulmonologists, cardiologists, and physical therapists.
The neuromuscular disease faculty participate in multicenter clinical trials for muscle disorders and study the clinical manifestations of neuromuscular disorders.
Neurogenetics Program
The neurogenetics program is a multidisciplinary center that offers consultation, evaluation, genetic testing, counseling, and disease management. Our board-certified and fellowship-trained neurologists and genetic counselors have extensive experience treating genetic neurological conditions in children of all ages. With Dell Medical School’s recently announced Pediatric Center for Rare Diseases, the neurogenetics program is expected to grow rapidly.
Dell Medical School
Dell Medical School at The University of Texas at Austin, the first new medical school to be built at a tier one US research university in nearly 50 years, graduated its first class in 2020. We are committed to redesigning academic medicine and revolutionizing how people get and stay healthy by educating leaders, developing new models of care, and advancing innovation from health products to health care delivery.
Dell Children’s Medical Center
With 300 beds, Dell Children’s Medical Center is the only full-service pediatric hospital in Central Texas. The main hospital features a level 1 pediatric trauma center, a level 4 neonatal intensive care unit, and a level 4 epilepsy center. Pediatric neuroscience is one of the hospital’s focus areas. A 160,000-square-foot building connected to the children’s hospital houses the pediatric neuroscience program as well as the cardiac care and cancer programs.
In 2023, Dell Children’s Medical Center North hospital opened in North Austin, with a new epilepsy clinic located in the hospital’s medical office building. The north campus’s epilepsy clinic will continue to expand services, along with other pediatric neuroscience clinics, as demand in North Austin continues to grow.
