Dell Medical School Pediatric Neuroscience Program
Promoting discovery and innovation in the pediatric neurosciences
In the run-up to the recent 50th annual meeting of the Child Neurology Society in Boston, CNS executive director Roger Larson ran down and back up the alphabet with his own personal review and observations about the history of the society. His article on countdown day 31 “R” was all about our chief, E. Steve Roach. Read all about it here: “R” is for Roach
Congratulations to the staff of our Neurofibromatosis Clinic for being accepted as a member of the NF Clinic Network of the Children’s Tumor Foundation – a major accomplishment for a new program. The NF Clinic Network recognizes clinics that provide comprehensive medical care to individuals with NF, foster patient education, and encourage participation in clinical research trials and the NF registry. Our clinic is co-directed by pediatric neurologist Dr. Manikum Moodley, MD, FRCP, who joined us in 2019 after serving for many years as co-director of the Neurofibromatosis Program at the Cleveland Clinic, and pediatric neuro-oncologist Dr. Virginia Harrod, MD, PhD. Both Dr. Moodley and Dr. Harrod have extensive experience with the diagnosis and management of neurofibromatosis. Our clinic coordinator is Karla Robles Lopez, MD, PhD, from the the Pediatric Neuroscience Program staff. This program is just one of many ways that UT Health Austin Pediatric Neurosciences at Dell Children’s is improving the care of children with neurological disease.
Audrey Brumback, MD, PhD, has been awarded a $553,729 grant from the National Institutes of Health to study how the thalamus is involved in brain functions that pose challenges for people with autism spectrum disorder. Dr. Brumback and her team will use mouse models to map the brain circuits involved in social/emotional behaviors as well as cognitive functions like attention and working memory. Dr. Brumback intends to use the results of these studies to design future treatments for the symptoms of autism spectrum disorder.
Dr. Brumback is also a member of a multidisciplinary UT Austin team that was recently awarded a multi-million-dollar grant from the Maternal and Child Health Bureau to establish the Autism Consortium of Texas Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental and Related Disabilities program (ACT LEND).
The ACT LEND program aims to increase the capacity of the workforce to better serve individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and other developmental disabilities (DD), especially those of underserved racial, ethnic, and rural populations in Texas. Dr. Brumback will oversee the training of medical students and residents who participate in the program. As a core team faculty member, Dr. Brumback will also provide mentorship as well as clinical and research opportunities for all ACT LEND trainees.
Congratulations to Dr. Mani Moodley, winner of this year’s child neurology faculty teaching award! He was selected by the child and adult neurology residents who spent time in the Pediatric Neurosciences Program in the last year.
Dr. Moodley’s selection comes as no surprise because he won several resident and student teaching awards at Cleveland Clinic before joining the Dell Medical School faculty two years ago. Fortunately, we have a rule preventing the same faculty member from winning the award in consecutive years, so there is hope for the rest of us!
Several members of our pediatric neurosciences team have embraced Women in Neuroscience (WiN), an Austin-based organization whose mission is to encourage young economically disadvantaged, first-generation, and underrepresented minority high school seniors or college women to pursue careers in neuroscience or neurology.
WiN offers a $3,000 stipend to support eight-week summer internships (thus “WiNterns”) during which each student works in a neuroscience-related research laboratory or on a clinical research project. Additionally, the program offers seminars and tutorials designed to facilitate professional development and leadership skills and provides ongoing mentorship.
WiN was established in 2018 to honor Harvey Nudelman, PhD, a neuroscience researcher and teacher who died from progressive supranuclear palsy. The organization partners with the University of Texas at Austin Department of Neuroscience, the Department of Neurology at Dell Medical School, Huston-Tillotson University, and the Ann Richards School for Young Women Leaders.
Audrey Brumback, MD, PhD, who has been hosting WiNterns since the program began, teaches skills such as PCR genotyping of transgenic mice and quantification of behavior in mouse models of autism. In 2021, three students worked on Dave Clarke, MD’s Discrepancies and Disparities in the Care of Children with Epilepsy project. Among the program’s seminars and tutorials was a half-day biomedical writing workshop taught by E. Steve Roach, MD, and tutorials by Brumback and Clarke.
For additional information on WiN, see www.neurowomen.org or follow the organization on Twitter at @helloneurowomen.
Audrey Brumback, MD, PhD, was recently appointed to the newly formed Child Neurology Society Leadership, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (LDEI) Task Force.
Brumback also serves as an elected member of the CNS board of directors. The LDEI committee has already designed several strategic initiatives to begin their work of making the field of child neurology diverse, equitable, and inclusive. “We’re just getting started. The goal is to bring about lasting change in everything from patient care to medical education and research,” Brumback said.
Thank you, Dr. Brumback, for giving your time to this important work and to the Child Neurology Society.
Brumback AC, et al. Introducing the Child Neurology Society Leadership, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Task Force. Ann Neurol 2021;90:537-538.
“We’re just getting started. The goal is to bring about lasting change in everything from patient care to medical education and research.”
On April 29, we celebrated the grand opening of the new home of UT Health Austin Pediatric Neurosciences at Dell Children’s in the Specialty Pavilion at Dell Children’s Medical Center. Our new home houses offices for pediatric neurology, neurosurgery, neuropsychology, epilepsy, and neuro-opthalmology as well as vastly expanded clinic space for all of our neuroscience clinical services where we are able to see all children without regard to their parent’s ability to pay for services. Thank you to Dell Children’s Medical Center for making this huge investment in the care of children with neurological disease.
The growth of Dell Children’s Medical Center and our world-class pediatric neuroscience program is making it possible for us to help children from all over Texas. Our doctors – Clifford Calley and Winson Ho – were featured in this heartwarming story about a little boy from the Texas valley who is making a wonderful recovery after they solved the mystery of his ailment. See the story in the May 17 issue of the Austin American-Statesman:
Dell Children’s Medical Center and UT Health Austin Pediatric Neurosciences – proof that the best medical care in the world is HERE.
We already knew that our 4-South inpatient team at Dell Children’s Hospital is as good as they come, because we work with them daily and our families often sing their praises. These dedicated people (many of them shown here) provide exceptional patient care and go above and beyond to help our neuroscience patients and their families. So we were not at all surprised when they recently received the Dell Children’s Hospital Daisy Award for outstanding team care. We are very proud of these folks and the work they do. Congratulations!
We are pleased to welcome Abbas Babajani-Feremi, PhD, to the Pediatric Neuroscience Program as Associate Professor of Neurology. He will oversee our magnetoencephalography (MEG) laboratory and facilitate MEG and imaging research. Dr. Babajani-Feremi comes to Dell Medical School from the University of Tennessee Health Science Center and Le Bonheur Children’s Hospital in Memphis, where he was Director of MEG research and head of their High-density Electroencephalography Laboratory. Dr. Babajani-Feremi is also a consummate scholar and educator, credited with over 50 peer-reviewed journal articles and numerous national and international invited lectures. Welcome to Austin Dr. Babajani-Feremi.
