Speakers
Andrew Brodbelt is a Consultant Neurosurgeon in Liverpool, UK. He trained in Liverpool, but took time out to complete his PhD entitled 'Investigations in post traumatic syringomyelia' in Sydney, Australia, with Prof Stoodley. This led to a life long interest in Chiari malforations and syringomyelia. He has published 18 peer reviewed papers and 3 book chapters on aspects of Chiari and syringomyelia. He has always been interested in the underlying pathphysiology of the condition, never more so than now with the current explosion in theories and associated conditions, which can make understanding and managing these patients so challenging. When not working he enjoys spending time with his family, as well as trying to get them mountain biking, road cycling, fell running, and hill walking.
Andrew Brodbelt
Consultant Neurosurgeon,
The Walton Centre NHS Foundation Trust, Liverpool, UK
Honorary Clinical Senior Lecturer
University of Liverpool
Title of Presentation
Workshop-Chiari Malformation: current status of the art
Harris received her PhD from the University of Utah and followed that with training at the Seattle Children’s Research Institute. She is broadly interested in understanding neuroinflammation and cell-biomaterial interactions in hydrocephalus. Using confocal microscopy, translational research, bench-top 3D culture models, and high-throughput microfluidic models, Harris works to understand the impact of the patient's individual conditions on failure of chronic indwelling devices implanted in the brain. The influence of brain injury, fluid dynamics, and blood-cerebrospinal fluid-barrier integrity is also captured within her research umbrella.
Carolyn Harris, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science
Secondary Appointments in Biomedical Engineering, Neurosurgery
Title of Presentation
Shunt technology and mulfunction: what should we know?
Nanna MacAulay, PhD, DMSci is Professor of Molecular Neurophysiology at Department of Neuroscience, University of Copenhagen. She trained in ion and water transport at University of Copenhagen, Denmark and McGill University, Canada, and was amongst the pioneers discovering the concept of cotransport of water. Her research focuses on resolving the molecular mechanisms of water transport in various cell types of the mammalian brain and has demonstrated cotransport of water as a key component in cerebrospinal secretion by the choroid plexus.
Professor Nanna MacAulay
Department of Neuroscience
University of Copenhagen
Denmark
Title of presentation
Our brains are full of water – but how does it enter?
Dr. Yasar has received her medical degree from the Semmelweis Medical University, School of Medical Sciences, (Budapest, Hungary) and later her Ph.D. in pharmacology at the the Semmelweis Medical University, School of Pharmacological Sciences. Dr. Yasar is a e fellowship-trained geriatrician with a focus on causes and treatment of dementia and research training in pharmacology. She was recruited to the faculty of the Division of Geriatric Medicine and Gerontology in 2001.
Dr. Yasar in collaboration with her colleagues developed (2002) and led the Memory Clinic within the Division of Geriatric Medicine and Gerontology. This clinic became the foundation for the Geriatric Medicine Division’s participation in the multidisciplinary Johns Hopkins Memory and Alzheimer’s Disease Treatment Center (MATC) (2009). Dr. Yasar’s clinical work in the memory clinic is complemented by research focusing on vascular risk factors and vascular risk modifying medications of late life memory disorders. Analysis of data from numerous observational and intervention studies has resulted in numerous publications from research supported by various grants.
In 2010 she was recruited by the Departments of Neurology and Neurosurgery to join the multidisciplinary Cerebrospinal Fluid Disorder Center for the evaluation of complex patients with gait and cognitive problems with a focus on normal pressure hydrocephalus (NPH). With her background in geriatrics, and also dementia, she brought a unique combination of skills to the evaluation and care of patients with NPH as well as extending to research aspects of these disorders. This resulted publications and research presentations at the Hydrocephalus meetings.
Sevil Yasar M.D., Ph.D.
Johns Hopkins University, School of Medicine, Division of Geriatric Medicine and Gerontology
Title of Presentation
Crosstalk between iNPH and geriatrics: from Dementia to Frailty
Mansoor Foroughi qualified from Sheffield Medical School UK, commencing neurosurgical training at the Royal London Hospital, before completing his formal Neurosurgical training program in University of Wales. This was followed by three fellowships including fellowship programs in Helsinki, Finland and Vancouver, Canada, during which he also completed his MSc program in Neurovascular diseases. On return to the UK, he worked as a senior fellow at Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham in both anterior & lateral skull base surgery and use of minimally invasive techniques, before working as a Consultant Neurosurgeon for several years at QEH Birmingham. While working in one of UK's largest and busiest Neurosurgical units, focusing on surgery of complex tumors (ventricular & pineal tumors, Neurovascular and skull base surgery, in keeping with the units international reputation he further focused on management of complex Hydrocephalus and the treatment of Chiari Malformations, Syringomyelia, colloid & arachnoid cysts and development of neuro-endoscopic procedures. While working for several years with Mr Graham Flint in Birmingham, and inspired by the international reputation of the unit originating from the work of Prof Bernard Williams, and gaining extensive experience in management of complex Chiari and syringomyelia cases in, he has been passionate about progress in the management of Chiari malformation in the adult population.
He has been working as consultant Neurosurgeon in South East England UK and is keen on use of problem based learning techniques, self-assessment & improvement with use of operative videos for training, advocating where possible routine recording of operations and also development and ethical use of Artificial Intelligence in Health care. He is passionate about development of CSF disorders as a subspecialty & section, with focus on complex hydrocephalus, Chiari Malformation, Syringomyelia, and Cranial & Spinal CSF pathway lesions.
Mr Mansoor Foroughi
MB ChB, FRCS, MSc, FRCS (SN), FEBNS
Consultant Neurosurgeon
Title of presentation
Workshop – Chiari Malformation: current status of the art
Apr. 1997 - : Neurosurgeon, Kyoto University Graduate School of Medicine
Apr, 2012 - Present: Research fellow, The University of Tokyo
Sep. 2013 - Sep. 2019: Rakuwakai Otowa Hospital
Oct. 2019 - Present: Shiga University of Medical Science
From 2001 to 2004, at the Kyoto University Graduate School, I learned the basics of genetics, statistics, 3D imaging and computational fluid dynamics.
From 2013 to 2019, at the Rakuwakai Otowa hospital, I learned about normal pressure hydrocephalus from Dr. Masatsune Ishikawa.
Shigeki Yamada
Department of Neurosurgery, Shiga University of Medical Science, Shiga, Japan
Interfaculty Initiative in Information Studies / Institute of Industrial Science, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
Presentation title
MRI in INPH: what really matters
Dr. Alfonso Fasano holds the Chair in Neuromodulation and Multi-Disciplinary Care at the University of Toronto and University Health Network. He is a Professor in the Department of Medicine (Division of Neurology) at the University of Toronto. He is staff neurologist and co-director of the Surgical Program for Movement Disorders at Toronto Western Hospital, University Health Network. He is also staff neurologist at the Hospital of Sick Children in Toronto. Dr. Fasano is a Clinician Investigator at the Krembil Research Institute and KITE – Toronto Rehabilitation Hospital. Dr. Fasano leads the Core E (closed-loop capabilities) of the CenteR for Advancing Neurotechnological Innovation to Application (CRANIA) and sits in the scientific advisory board of the Dystonia Medical Research Foundation and International Essential Tremor Foundation. He’s the chair of the Normal Pressure Hydrocephalus study group of and member of the study group on tremor of the International Parkinson Movement Disorders Society; he’s also member of the Tremor Research Group and the Parkinson Study Group.
Dr. Fasano received his medical degree from the Catholic University of Rome, Italy, in 2002 and became a neurologist in 2007. After a 2-year fellowship at the University of Kiel, Germany, he completed a PhD in neuroscience at the Catholic University of Rome. His main areas of interest are the treatment of movement disorders with advanced technology (infusion pumps and neuromodulation), pathophysiology, and treatment of tremor and gait disorders. He authored more than 300 scientific papers and book chapters. Dr. Fasano is the co-editor of the section “Gaps and Controversies” of Movement Disorders Journal and editorial board member of Annals of Neurology, Movement Disorders Journal, Movement Disorders Clinical Practice and Parkinsonism and Related Disorders. He is also the principal investigator of several clinical trials.
Alfonso Fasano, MD, PhD
Edmond J. Safra Program in Parkinson’s Disease, Morton and Gloria Shulman Movement Disorders Clinic, Toronto Western Hospital, UHN, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Division of Neurology, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Krembil Brain Institute, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Presentation title
Is Hydrocephalus Treatment functional Neurosurgery?
He graduated from Warsaw University of Technology, Faculty of Electronics, Poland in 1980. In 1987 he presented his PhD thesis on Frequency Analysis of Intracranial Pressure and defended it at his Alma Mater.
Since 1991 he works at University of Cambridge, UK, Division on Neurosurgery on ICP analysis, Cerebral Blood Flow monitoring and mathematical modelling of brain fluids dynamics. He authored and co-authored 702 papers in his speciality (listed in PubMed). In www.expertscape.com he is listed as a top world expert on Intracranial Pressure. He is a founder of Brain Physics Laboratory which works as an integral part of Division of Neurosurgery.
Prof Marek Czosnyka
She graduated from Warsaw University of Technology, Faculty of Electronics, Poland in 1980. In 2005 she presented her PhD thesis on Hydrodynamic Properties of Hydrocephalus Shunts and defended it at her Alma Mater.
Since 1993 she works at University of Cambridge, UK, Division on Neurosurgery on CSF dynamics in Hydrocephalus and Idiopathic Intracranial Hypertension, CSF shunts testing in-vivo, mathematical modelling of brain fluids dynamics. She authored and co-authored 142 papers in her speciality (listed in PubMed). On www.expertscape.com she is listed as 12th world expert on Hydrocephalus.
Dr. Zofia Helena Czosnyka
Shinya Yamada is a consulting neurosurgeon at Kugayama hospital Tokyo Japan and has an appointment with Juntendo University Neurosurgery. I have enthusiastically engaged in research in physiology in cerebrospinal fluid and interstitial fluid of the brain for a number of years, as general neurosurgeon. Water behavior in the brain is always problematic when patients have disease in the brain. I worked at the brain physiology laboratory at Brown University in the US under instruction of prof. Helen F Cserr who intensively study brain interstitial fluid. I learned all basic brain physiology at her laboratory. Her discovery of interstitial fluid physiology is now known as part of the Glymphatic system recently. I quantitatively measured ISF drainage into Lymphatic system from different lesion of the brain. I had been involved in interstitial fluid and cerebrospinal fluid experiments for years. Modifying Helen’s brain microinjection method, I developed quantitative AB clearance measurement in experimental animal model with Gordon McComb and Berislav V Zlokovic at University Southern California. This is the very first discovery of quantitative AB clearance from the brain. I wondered if the external tracer could trace the cerebrospinal fluid real motion. I got an ideal tracer for visualized cerebrospinal fluid motion in 2004 using MRI arterial spin labeling technique. In this method, cerebrospinal fluid itself can be uses as an internal tracer. Since then, I applied this MRI sequence for various clinical cerebrospinal fluid related disorders as well as normal brain. I found cerebrospinal fluid dynamics are far different from what we believed even in the normal brain. I am a neurosurgeon in practice. I found this MRI technique is very useful to understand what is going on in an individual case and give us the vital information of treatment strategies including drug delivery to the brain.
Shinya Yamada, M.D., Ph.D.
Consulting Neurosurgeon, Kugayama Hospital, Tokyo Japan
Department of Neurosurgery, Juntendo University, Tokyo Japan
Holding his B.Sc. and license to practice medicine from the Medical School of Georg-August-University Prof. Dr. med. Hans Christoph Ludwig finished his residency at Medical University in Göttingen, Germany in 1997. He continued his career as Consultant for Neurosurgery, Intensive Care Medicine, since 1999 for Pediatric Neurosurgery. Furthermore, he received his PhD-Thesis, entitled “The Expression of Nitric Oxide Synthases in Human Astrocytoma” in 2001.
Today, Prof. Dr. med. Hans Christoph Ludwig works since 2012 as the Head of the Division of Pediatric Neurosurgery, Dept. of Neurosurgery at University Medical Center Göttingen. He is an expert on Neuroendoscopy, Laser Surgery, Brain Tumors and Hydrocephalus while he is member in several global medical associations. He is assistant Professor for Neurosurgery since 2008. Furthermore since 2015 he is Chair of the Division of Pediatric Neurosurgery of the German Society for Neurosurgery DGNC.
Prof. Dr. med. Hans Christoph Ludwig
Division of Pediatric Neurosurgery
Department of Neurosurgery
University Medical Center Göttingen
Georg-August-University Göttingen
Masatsune Ishikawa, M.D. , Ph.D.
Dr. Theresa Harbauer, specialized Neonatologist and Pediatrician from Germany, recently working as a senior pediatric consultant at the University Hospital of Eppendorf, Hamburg, North Germany. Already early in her education she lost her heart to the African Continent and its smallest patients and people. Graduated from medschool in 2008, she left her homebase in Germany to start working as a pediatric doctor in a rural missionary hospital in Tansania, East Africa from 2011-2013. During her time there she came across with many children born with Spina Bifida and Hydrocephalus that had been lacking adequate medical treatment and after care. She was locally trained in VP-Shunt procedures to fill the gap of missing local surgical personel, to provide urgent care and to train others young local doctors before her return to Germany. She founded Haydom-Friends e.V., a German non profit NGO, to finance a local program that secures medical treatment, surgeries, staff and parents education as well as postsurgical aftercare for patients with Spina Bifida and Hydrocephalus. Back in Germany she is now working in Hamburg in the North of Germany while her mind, heart and and passion is still beating for the global south. She is partnering with international organisations to secure and improve medical treatment for children born with SBH in Tansania and worldwide. Twice yearly she is joining the local team at Haydom Hospital, Tansania for one week to see more than 80 children with SBH that underwent successful surgery and treatment throughout the program and the local team. Recently with the team of Haydom there are planning to build a centre for children with SBH and their parents to receive trainings and postsurgical after care – a House of Hope in Haydom. www.haydom-friends.org
Dr.Theresa Harbauer
Senior pediatric consultant University Hospital Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany
Dr. Iskandar is Professor of Neurosurgery and Pediatrics, and Director of the Pediatric Neurosurgery program at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, Wisconsin. He completed his medical studies at the University of Pennsylvania, a neurosurgical residency at Duke University, and a Pediatric Neurosurgery fellowship at The Children’s Hospital in Birmingham, Alabama. Dr. Iskandar’s clinical expertise and research interests focus on congenital diseases including hydrocephalus, Chiari malformations, and spinal dysraphism, as well as healing mechanisms after brain and spinal cord injury and disease. Specifically, his group has contributed to the understanding of the heterogeneity of foramen magnum CSF flow in Chiari I patients; as well, motivated by the role of folic acid in spina bifida prevention, he directs a translational research laboratory that has discovered a link between single carbon folate metabolism, epigenetic influences, and axonal regeneration after central nervous system injury. Dr. Iskandar’s research in hydrocephalus aims to understand the pathophysiology of ventricular shunt malfunction. The Wisconsin Hydrocephalus Project (WHP) is a group of engineers, physicists, neurologists, and neurosurgeons founded by Dr. Iskandar to achieve this goal and design a smart valve system for the treatment of hydrocephalus.
Dr. Bermans Iskandar
Professor of Neurosurgery and Pediatrics
Director of Pediatric Neurosurgery
University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin
Graduated University of Århus, Denmark in 1973. Specialist in Neurology 1980.
PhD Thesis 1982: "Cerebrospinal Fluid Proteins in Degenerative Neurological
Disorders". Dept. of Neurology, Gothenburg University Sweden
2000 Professor of Neurology, Gothenburg University, Sweden.
Chairperson at the Institution of Clinical Neuroscience, Faculty of Medicine, Gothenburg University, 1997-2005.
Head of Division of Clinical Neuroscience, Sahlgrenska University Hospital, 1996-97.
Professor Emeritus 2014 -
Co-editor for Acta Neurologica Scandinavica 2007 -
President of ”Hydrocephalus2006”, International Meeting in Gothenburg
President of the International Society of Hydrocephalus and CSF disorders (ISHCSF) 2008 -2010,
President of Nordic Hydrocephalus Academy 2006 -10
Sixteen PhD students. Around 150 peer reviewed articles published.
Prof. Carsten Illum Wikkelsø
Professor Emeritus
Institute of Neuroscience and Physiology,
Sahlgrens Academy,
University of Gothenburg, Sweden
Mark Johnson, MD, PhD graduated Magna Cum Laude with a degree in chemistry from Amherst College in 1986. Dr. Johnson then matriculated at Harvard Medical School, where he earned a medical degree and a Ph.D. in neurobiology in 1995. He completed an internship in general surgery and a residency in neurosurgery at the University of Washington in Seattle in 2003. While at the University of Washington, Dr. Johnson also performed postdoctoral research on mechanisms of neuronal cell death occurring after injury. He received an NIH postdoctoral National Research Service Award and, after his appointment as Acting Instructor at the University of Washington in 2003, he was also awarded an NIH K08 Research Award to support his work.
Upon completion of his residency, Dr. Johnson returned to Boston to join the Department of Neurosurgery at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School where he rose to the position of Associate Professor. He has received numerous scientific awards, including a Sontag Distinguished Scientist Award in 2004 and an NIH Director’s New Innovator Award in 2007. In 2016, Dr. Johnson was appointed Professor and Chair of the Department of Neurosurgery at the University of Massachusetts Medical School and the University of Massachusetts Memorial Medical Center. Since 2003, he has maintained an NIH-funded research laboratory that is focused on the cellular and molecular biology of brain tumors as well as the genetics of idiopathic normal pressure hydrocephalus.
Mark D. Johnson, M.D., Ph.D., FAANS
Maroun Semaan Professor of Neurological Surgery
Chair, Department of Neurological Surgery
Senior Consulting Vice Provost for Mentorship, Leadership and Transformation
Director, Neurological Surgery Residency Program
Director, Brain Tumor Program
UMass Memorial Healthcare
University of Massachusetts Medical School
Presentation title
INPH and Genetics: lessons learned from the lab
Mr Ahmed Toma is a consultant neurosurgeon at the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery (NHNN), Queen Square, UCLH NHS Foundation Trust and The Cleveland Clinic London. He is also an Honorary associate professor in the department of brain repair and rehabilitation at UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology.
Having graduated from medical school with distinction, he went on to pursue clinical neurosurgical training mostly at Queen Square where he was appointed as a consultant neurosurgeon in December 2014. He did two years research fellowship studying normal pressure hydrocephalus at Queen Square and was awarded an MD (Res.) postgraduate degree from St George’s University of London in adult hydrocephalus in 2012.
Having completed one year of interventional neuroradiology fellowship at the National hospital at Queen Square, he is one of the few vascular neurosurgeons in the UK who are dual trained both in endovascular and open surgical neurovascular techniques.
His clinical practice includes: Adult hydrocephalus AND Neurovascular surgery.
Neuromodulation: occipital nerve stimulation
He is a member of the International Society for Hydrocephalus and Cerebrospinal Fluid Disorders Board of directors, the UK CSF advisory group and British neurovascular group (BNVG) UK CSF leak association scientific advisory group
Mr Ahmed Toma MB ChB, FRCS (Neuro.Surg.), MD (Res.)
Consultant Neurosurgeon and Honorary associate professor
National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery at Queen Square
Cleveland clinic London
University College London
Presentation title
CSF AND ICP: ITS PHYSIOLOGY, ITS PATHOLOGY