Archives: Experts

Mark J. Burish, MD, PhD, who is board certified in neurology and fellowship trained in pain medicine, specializes in the treatment of neck pain, back pain, and neuropathic pain. His research interests focus on headache and facial pain.

A cum laude graduate of Princeton University, Dr. Burish received his MD/PhD in the Vanderbilt Medical Scientist Training Program at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. He completed his residency in neurology at the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF), where he was co-chief resident of the UCSF Moffitt-Long Medical Service and was inducted into Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Medical Society. During his residency, he was also honored with the Core Clerkship Teaching Award, voted by third-year medical students as one of five residents who went “above and beyond in terms of dedication to teaching, mentorship, community building, patient care, and medical-student development and support.” He completed his fellowship in interventional pain management in the Department of Anesthesiology at UCSF.

Dr. Burish is a co-author of articles that have appeared in The BMJ, The Lancet Neurology, JAMA Neurology, Neurology, and PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America), among others.

In addition to his membership in Alpha Omega Alpha, he is a member of the American Academy of Neurology and a fellow of the American Headache Society.

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Alan Kaplan worked for over 25 years in the fine wine and spirits industry and 15 years in the restaurant business. His career was cut short by the onset of new daily persistent headache (NDPH), a rare and challenging condition he was diagnosed with around 2018. After exploring various treatments without success, Alan recognized a significant gap in research, information, and FDA-approved treatments for NDPH, which motivated him to take action. This insight led him to shift from patient to dedicated patient advocate.

In 2022, Alan founded the nonprofit NDPHaware, a registered organization focused on promoting research and awareness for NDPH. His advocacy began in 2021, participating in events like the Clusterbusters conference, Coalition for Headache and Migraine Patients (CHAMP) gatherings, the Migraine World Summit, and Headache on the Hill. With the support of Clusterbusters, Alan established NDPHaware, and since then, he has engaged in initiatives like attending American Headache Society conferences and helping to create the first NDPH Patient Experience Survey alongside Dr. Burish and other specialists.

Alan is currently untreated for NDPH and remains dedicated to raising awareness and advocating for more effective treatments for this condition.

Dr. Dale Bond is director of research integration at Hartford HealthCare and co-director of the Hartford HealthCare Digestive Health Institute’s Center for Obesity Research, Innovation, and Education. His research involves assessing and intervening on health behaviors in the context of obesity and related conditions (including migraine) and treatments (metabolic bariatric surgery, obesity-modifying medications, and lifestyle interventions). With grants awarded by the National Institutes of Health and other organizations, he has served as principal and co-investigator on several prospective observational studies and randomized clinical trials pursuant to the advancement of these areas. Of note, he has also conducted seminal studies focused on the interrelationships of migraine with physical activity, obesity, and weight loss.

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Dr. Devika Umashanker is the system medical director for obesity medicine at Hartford HealthCare Medical and Surgical Weight Loss, Hartford HealthCare Digestive Health Institute. She is an associate professor of internal medicine at the Frank H. Netter School of Medicine, Quinnipiac University, and the program director of the Obesity Medicine Fellowship at Hartford Healthcare. She is board certified in internal medicine and fellowship trained in obesity medicine at NewYork-Presbyterian Weill Cornell Medical Center.

Dr. Umashanker’s primary areas of expertise include weight management, preoperative weight loss, and post-operative bariatric surgical care and nutrition management.  Her research focus includes optimization of nonsurgical treatment modalities in patients with a history of bariatric surgery and obesity, association of weight stigma and bias on patient clinical outcomes, and prevalence of migraine in patients seeking treatment in medical and surgical weight loss. Dr. Umashanker was awarded the 2023 Integrated Health Emerging Scientist Award by the International Federation for the Surgery of Obesity and Metabolic Disorders.

Dr. Umashanker has written several publications and book chapters on the topics of obesity management and treatment, pharmacotherapy for obesity, and weight stigma and bias.

Kristen K. Steenerson, MD, is a board-certified neurologist fellowship-trained in vestibular neurology. She graduated cum laude from Claremont McKenna College. She completed medical school at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, followed by a neurology residency at Mayo Clinic in Arizona, where she served as chief resident. There, she discovered the unmet need of patients with vertigo and vestibular symptoms, motivating her to pursue a fellowship in otoneurology/neuro-otology at Barrow Neurological Institute in Phoenix. She joined Stanford Medicine with positions in both the Otolaryngology — Head & Neck Surgery and the Neurology & Neurological Sciences departments, with the goal of jointly addressing the junction of inner ear and brain disorders. Her specific interests include vestibular migraine, benign paroxysmal positional vertigo, Ménière’s disease, and international neurology.

Dr. Elena Gross is a neuroscientist with a PhD in clinical research who has firsthand experience living with chronic migraine. The lack of tolerable and efficacious treatment options for migraine led her to pursue a MSc in neuroscience at the University of Oxford and a PhD in clinical research at the University of Basel, with the goal of having better understanding of this common and debilitating disease and ultimately improving clinical care.

Dr. Gross is passionate about the therapeutic benefits of ketosis and other nutritional interventions, the role of mitochondrial functioning and energy metabolism in brain health and neurological diseases (particularly migraine), as well as increasing our health span via disease prevention. She holds four patents, and is the founder and CEO of Brain Ritual. Her migraine research papers have been published in high-ranking journals such as Nature Reviews Neurology and Scientific Reports.

Dr. Apigian is a double board-certified physician who specializes in trauma, attachment, addictions, and addressing trauma on a cellular level. She earned her medical degree at Loma Linda University and has a master’s in biochemistry and in public health. She trained for three years as a general surgeon before changing her career path.

In addition to her medical studies, Dr. Apigian has studied with and participated in Dr. Allan Schore’s attachment regulation theory study group. She is a highly trained somatic experiencing practitioner, trained in NeuroAffective Touch, Internal Family Systems (parts work), and the Instinctual Trauma Response Model. She continues to attend advanced training in somatic experiencing with Dr. Peter Levine and acts as an editor for the website Somatic Experiencing International.

Dr. Apigian proactively seeks solutions, consistently striving to enhance the existing approach to expedite the journey toward optimal health and self-improvement.

Dr. Olivia Begasse de Dhaem, a board-certified neurologist, serves as a headache specialist at the Hartford HealthCare Headache Center in Westport, Conn. Having completed her medical education and neurology residency at Columbia University in New York City, she further honed her expertise with a headache medicine fellowship at Harvard University. Dr. Begasse de Dhaem has authored numerous publications in headache medicine and has delivered talks on both national and international platforms. She is the executive editor of the Pain Medicine journal, and a co-editor of the textbook Headache: What Do I Do Now? released by Oxford University Press in April 2023.

Dr. Begasse de Dhaem is actively involved in various medical societies. She holds positions on the Education Committee of the International Headache Society, is a Fellow of the American Headache Society (AHS), and contributes to the AHS Advocacy Committee. A passionate advocate, she graduated from the American Academy of Neurology (AAN) Palatucci Advocacy Leadership Forum and is part of the executive committee of the International Headache Society’s Global Patient Advocacy Coalition (IHS-GPAC). With four appearances at Headache on the Hill, she played a role in drafting the paper that bolstered the advocacy efforts of 2020. Her primary advocacy focus is championing the rights of individuals with headache diseases in professional settings.

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Interviews from Olivia Begasse de Dhaem, MD, FAHS

How To Manage Migraine Stigma at Work

Dr. Hershey is a board-certified neurologist and the endowed chair and director of neurology at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. He also is a professor of pediatrics and neurology at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine. Dr. Hershey’s research interests currently include the improved diagnosis and treatment of childhood headache disorders, characterization of outcome responses, studies in new pharmacological and nonpharmacological treatment regimes, and the genomics of migraines.

Dr. Hershey has been an active member of the International Headache Society since 1998, serving on several committees, including the Child and Adolescent Standing Committee (currently the chair of the committee), the Classification Committee, and most recently, the Grading Committee. He is also active in the American Headache Society (AHS), where he served as a board member from 2006-2016, as well as on several sections, and is currently the chair of the Guidelines Committee. For the American Academy of Neurology (AAN), he served two terms as the chair of the Headache and Facial Pain Section and was involved with writing the acute and preventive treatment guidelines for children and adolescents with migraine, co-sponsored by the AAN and the AHS. He has actively advised on many pharmaceutical studies and is an active member of several committees for the National Institutes of Health, including study groups under the HEAL (Helping to End Addiction Long-Term) Initiative.

Dale Nyholt, PhD, is a human geneticist expert in the statistical analysis of common complex traits. Professor Nyholt is the head of the Statistical and Genomic Epidemiology Laboratory (SGEL), Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation (IHBI), Queensland University of Technology (QUT). He is also a professor at the School of Biomedical Sciences, Faculty of Health, QUT. Professor Nyholt’s expertise spans statistical genetic and genomic analysis, epidemiology, bioinformatics, and biostatistics.

The SGEL studies the role of genetics in the development and mechanism of human traits, with particular emphasis on migraine. The lab’s specific goal is to identify genetic risk factors, understand their biological consequences, and detect common genetic links with other disorders, including depression, endometriosis, and epilepsy. The identification of such causal genetic factors and how they interact with environmental exposures will provide a deeper understanding of the etiology of migraine and our ability to prevent and treat attacks, as well as facilitate the discovery of novel pathways, and thus identify new targets for drug therapy. SGEL also develops novel statistical bioinformatics programs used by researchers worldwide.

Dr. Elizabeth K. Seng is an associate professor at the Ferkauf Graduate School of Psychology, Yeshiva University, and a research associate professor at the Saul R. Korey Department of Neurology, Albert Einstein College of Medicine.

Dr. Seng’s research is broadly focused on behavioral management of pain and headache disorders, particularly migraine. She is interested in the psychosocial factors associated with migraine attack onset, higher attack frequency, and migraine-related disability. She is also interested in improving acute medication adherence.

Courtney Seebadri-White, MD is a general neurologist in Philadelphia. She is currently an assistant professor of neurology at Sidney Kimmel Medical College at Thomas Jefferson University, and is also the associate director for the neurology clerkship. She received her medical degree at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., in 2016 and completed her residency in neurology and fellowship in headache medicine at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia in 2020 and 2021, respectively.

Dr. Seebadri-White specializes in diagnosis and treatment of neurological disorders, including headache disorders, stroke, epilepsy, Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease, and others. As a person with migraine, she understands the challenges in the journey to diagnosis and treatment of headache disorders and the need for increased awareness of and advocacy for these conditions. Dr. Seebadri-White loves teaching medical students, her patients, and the community in general.

With a profound commitment to empowering the next generation, Amy Graham brings over two decades of expertise as a creative nonprofit leader. Her unwavering dedication to grassroots organizing and program development has transformed the output of organizations she has led.

Thanks to her exceptional leadership approach in leading LiveFeed, an organization that utilized the music community to address childhood hunger, she was awarded the esteemed Washington University Social Entrepreneurship and Innovation Award.

With a strong dedication to empowering underprivileged communities and ensuring that every child has the chance to succeed, she is utilizing her personal experience with migraine as the driving force behind her leadership of the Migraine at School initiative.

Rob joined The Migraine Trust as chief executive in February 2021 and through positive collaborations is determined to see improvements in migraine care, treatments, and access for people living with migraine. Rob has over 30 years of experience working for healthcare charities, starting out as a fundraiser, and before his current position, he held similar roles at Jo’s Cervical Cancer Trust and Endometriosis U.K. He brings a range of skills, including implementing organizational growth and development, public affairs management, service development, health and policy influence, fundraising, and media and communications.