LEAP Program Class of 2015

Jawad Bajwa, MD    
Director, Parkinson’s, Movement Disorders and Neurorestoration Program
National Neuroscience Institute, King Fahad Medical City
Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

Dr. Bajwa obtained his medical degree from King Edward Medical University, Lahore, Pakistan and completed neurology residency at Georgetown University Hospital, Washington, DC. Thereafter, he completed a multiyear clinical fellowship in Parkinson’s disease, Movement Disorders and Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) with special emphasis on intraoperative neurophysiological mapping for DBS surgeries and translational research in the field of Movement Disorders and Neuromodulation at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation. He also developed and directed the 1st community based Parkinson’s disease and Movement Disorders Center in St. Paul, MN, USA.

Currently he is in the process of developing the first Comprehensive Interdisciplinary Parkinson’s, Movement Disorders and Neuromodulation Clinical and Research Program in the Middle East. He also previously organized the 1st MDS Middle East Camp for Parkinson’s, Movement Disorders and Neuromodulation in 2014 which was held in Dubai, UAE.

Han-Joon Kim, MD, PhD
Associate Professor, Department of Neurology
Seoul National University Hospital
Seoul, Korea

Dr. Kim obtained his degree from the Medical College of Seoul National University and then accepted an internship and residency in neurology at the Seoul National University Hospital. His career as a Movement Disorder Specialist began in 2005 when he served as a clinical fellow in the Department of Neurology and Movement Disorders (MDC) at the same hospital.

Since 2006, Dr. Kim has worked as an independent clinician and researcher as well as a member of Professor Beom Jeon’s team. As a teaching neurologist, Dr. Kim devotes his time to the teaching and training of fellows, residents, and medical students.

Chin-Hsien Lin, MD, PhD
Attending Physician and Assistant Professor, Department of Neurology
National Taiwan University Hospital (NTUH)
Taipei, Taiwan

Dr. Lin’s main clinical and research interests are genetic study, molecular biology and Drosophila animal model of Parkinson’s disease and related movement disorders. She has been a previous chairman of the Department of Neurology at Yun-Lin branch of NTUH for 2 years. In this role, she organized both the administrative and academic activities of department of Neurology in this regional hospital. Dr. Lin is also the former General Secretary of Taiwan Movement Disorders Society (TMDS) and is now an active member of the Executive Committee of TMDS.

Genko Oyama, MD, PhD
Associate Professor, Department of Neurology
Juntendo University Hospital
Tokyo, Japan

Dr. Oyama completed his residency in Neurology at Juntendo University Hospital and at affiliated institutes in 2006, under the direction of Professor Yoshikuni Mizuno. He studied neurophysiological analysis of genetic mice model of Parkinson’s disease under the direction of Professor Nobutaka Hattori, and obtained his PhD degree from Juntendo University Graduate School of Medicine in 2010. He completed his movement disorder fellowship under the direction of Professor Michael Okun at the University of Florida, Center for Movement Disorders & Neurorestoration in 2011. He is a member of Movement Disorders Unit at Juntendo University Hospital and his research interests have been focused on neuromodulation technology, particularly deep brain stimulation (DBS) and optogenetic neuromodulation for movement disorders.

Jean-Christophe Corvol, MD, PhD
Professor of Neurology
Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital
Paris, France

Prof. Corvol has a training in both clinical (MD, 2003) and basic (PhD, 2005) research in the field of Neurology and Pharmacology. After a residency in Neurology in Paris, he completed a PhD on dopamine signal transduction in animal models of Parkinson’s disease and drug addiction. He had a postdoctoral position (2006-2007) in the lab of molecular neurogenetics of Jorge Oksenberg (UCSF) where he did transcriptomics experiments. In 2007, as Assistant Professor at the Department of Pharmacology at the Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital he began to participate in clinical research. Currently, Prof. Corvol is Professor of Neurology at the Department of Neurology of the same hospital, at the head of the Clinical Research Center for Neurosciences, co-chair of the French clinical research network for Parkinson’s disease and movement disorders (NS-Park), and PI in the neurogenetic research laboratory at the ICM (Alexis Brice). His fields of interest are pharmacology, genetics and pharmacogenetics of Parkinson’s disease. He is a member of the French Society for Neurology, the French Society for Pharmacology, MDS, the Scientific Committee for Neurosciences of INSERM, and a new member of the editorial board of Movement Disorders. He is author of 84 papers referenced in PubMed.

Susanne A. Schneider, MD
Consultant Neurologist, Department of Neurology
University Hospital Kiel
Munich, Germany

Dr. Schneider gained her neurological training at the UCL Institute of Neurology (2005-2008) and the University of Lübeck, Germany (2008-2012), and completed a PhD program in the field of Neuroscience in London and Habilitation in Germany. She has published in a number of high impact journals, and has been awarded several internationally prestigious prizes including the William Koller Memorial Fund Award from the International Movement Disorder Society, the Jon Stolk Award in Movement Disorders for Young Investigators from the American Academy of Neurology and the David Marsden Award from the European Dystonia Society, as well as other prizes and awards. She has lectured at national and international scientific meetings and Movement Disorders training programs and is an Editorial board member of the Movement Disorders Journal.

Matej Skorvanek, MD, PhD
Clinician, Department of Neurology
Safarik University and University Hospital of L. Pasteur
Kosice, Slovak Republic

Dr. Skorvanek graduated the Medical Faculty and later received specialization in Neurology at the Safarik University in Kosice, Slovakia. He finished his PhD at the University of Groningen, Netherlands. During his training in the field of Movement Disorders he attended study stays at Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic and at UCL, Queens Square, London, UK. Later he initiated and now is in charge of the DBS program for Movement Disorders and pump therapies for advanced Parkinson’s disease in the University Hospital of L. Pasteur in Kosice, Slovakia. He is actively involved within the MDS Task Force on the Development of the MDS-UPDRS and the EU COST action “European network for the study of dystonia syndromes”. His main research interests include non-motor symptoms and quality of life issues in Parkinson’s disease, premotor biomarkers of Parkinson’s disease with focus on tissue biomarkers and clinical and genetic research of dystonia syndromes.

Maria Stamelou, MD, PhD
Consultant Neurologist, Second Department of Neurology
University of Athens
Athens, Greece

Dr. Stamelou completed her medical studies in Thessaloniki, Greece and then joined the Department of Neurology in Philipps University Marburg in 2005. She started, at the same time, clinical research mainly on PSP, and established a specialized out-patient clinic for atypical parkinsonian conditions, which counted more than 100 patients with PSP, after two years. After completing neurology training, she joined UCL, Queen Square, with Prof Kailash Bhatia.

Dr. Stamelou has been invited the last four consecutive years to give a talk in the MDS International Congress and also in MDS Summer School. She is a member of the MDS PSP-study group, the MDS study group for developing a CBD staging system, and the MDS tremor task-force for the classification of tremor. She has been assistant editor in Movement Disorders Journal since April 2013. In October 2014, she organized the first MDS teaching course in Athens, “Genetics of Parkinson’s disease and parkinsonian syndromes in clinical practice”. This was the first MDS course with this topic.

Roy N. Alcalay, MD
Florence Irving Assistant Professor of Neurology
Columbia University Medical Center
Division of Movement Disorders
New York, NY, United States

Dr. Alcalay completed his medical degree at the Sackler School of Medicine, Tel Aviv, Israel. Following this, he participated in an Internal Medicine Internship and Neurology Residency at Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA. He completed his Movement Disorders Fellowship at the Columbia University Medical Center, New York, NY where he currently serves as the Florence Irving Assistant Professor of Neurology at the Taub Institute. Throughout Dr. Alcalay’s medical education and training, he has engaged in research related to aging and neurodegenerative disorders.

Brandon R. Barton, MD
Movement Disorders Neurologist, Assistant Professor
Rush University Medical Center and Jesse Brown VA Medical Center
Chicago, IL, United States

Dr. Barton completed his medical degree from the Medical College of Wisconsin. He then completed his residency, fellowship and MS in Clinical Research from Rush University Medical College in Chicago, IL. Since 2009, Dr. Barton has divided his time between the Jesse Brown VA Medical Center and Rush University Medical Center. He is involved in the PADRECC/Consortium, and his expertise includes a combination of teaching, clinical activities, and research.

Tiago A. Mestre, MD, MSc,
Assistant Professor
University of Ottawa
Ottawa, ON, Canada

Dr. Mestre received medical training at the University of Lisbon, Portugal and completed Masters’ degrees in Neuroscience and Clinical Epidemiology. After completing a neurology residence in Lisbon, Portugal, he completed a Clinical Fellowship in Movement Disorders with Dr. Anthony E. Lang from 2010-2013. Dr. Mestre’s primary research interests are in the field of Movement Disorders, with particular emphasis on Parkinson’s disease and Huntington’s disease (HD). He currently serves as Chair of the MDS sub-committee for the review of clinical rating scales in Huntington’s disease, as well as the clinical director of the Enroll-HD study.

Currently, Dr. Mestre is junior faculty at the University of Ottawa and an associated scientist at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute. He also directs the local Deep Brain Stimulation program for Movement Disorders.

Santiago Perez Lloret, MD, PhD
Full-time Researcher
Argentinean National Research Council
Buenos Aires, Argentina

Dr. Perez Lloret is a pharmacologist, specialized in epidemiology, with a special interest in degenerative disorders and related conditions. After obtaining his MD, he joined the Buenos Aires University PhD program while at the same time completing his training as a pharmacologist at the Clinical Pharmacology Center (FLENI). After completing both programs, Dr. Perez Lloret performed a post-doc training at the Pharmacology Department of the Toulouse University. During that time, he specialized in epidemiology. After coming back to Argentina, he led a Clinical PK Unit, before entering the Argentinean National Council as a full-time researcher.  Dr. Perez Lloret’s areas of interest include drugs’ safety and effectiveness, Parkinson’s disease, neurodegenerative disorders, chronobiology, and cardiovascular aging.