2019 National Conference

John F. Alksne, MD, is a board-certified neurosurgeon who focuses on the care of patients with neurological conditions such as trigeminal neuralgia, glossopharyngeal neuralgia, and acoustic neuroma. Dr. Alksne has pioneered new surgical techniques and technologies to advance the treatment of diseases and disorders of the central nervous system. Along with Dr. Peter Jannetta he pioneered the use of MVD surgery to treat trigeminal neuralgia. He was instrumental in establishing the UC San Diego Program in Gene Therapy, which includes research, training and clinical trials. Dr. Alksne is a charter member of the FPA Medical Advisory Board.

Dr. Brown is the Neurosurgery Director of the Winthrop-University Hospital CyberKnife® Program and Chief of Neurosurgery at Mercy Medical Center, Rockville Centre, New York. During his career Dr. Brown has published more than 50 articles in peer-reviewed neurosurgery journals. Topics include the treatment of chronic pain, especially facial pain, spinal, vascular, tumor and trauma neurosurgery.
Since his arrival in New York, Dr. Brown has been included in Castle Connolly’s list of top doctors in New York in each ensuing year. In recognition of his long-term interest in the treatment of complex facial pain syndromes, his colleagues elected him to be chair of the Medical Advisory Board of the Facial Pain Association.

Dr. Chang is a Professor and Vice Chairman of Strategic Development and Innovation in the Department of Neurosurgery at Stanford.. His clinical work and research focuses on the treatment of brain tumors and cerebrovascular disease. Dr. Chang also specializes in the treatment arteriovenous malformations and cavernous malformations of the brain and spine, and surgical treatment of intracranial aneurysms. A fellowship trained cerebrovascular neurosurgeon, Dr. Chang specializes in multi-modality therapy for these vascular lesions. He is also an expert in both microsurgery and radiosurgery for treatment of trigeminal neuralgia. Dr. Chang is a newly elected member of the FPA Medical Advisory Board.

Dr. Lim is Professor of Neurosurgery and Director of Brain Tumor Immunotherapy at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Dr. Lim’s expertise and research interests include neurosurgery, radiosurgery, brain tumors and trigeminal neuralgia. Dr. Lim has co-authored more than one hundred original science publications and is a newly elected member of the Facial Pain Association’s Medical Advisory Board.

Dr. Nixdorf is an Associate Professor and Acting Director, Division of TMD & Orofacial Pain at the University of Minnesota School of Dentistry. Dr. Nixdorf’s clinical interests include the diagnosis and management of chronic orofacial pains. This includes TMD pain and jaw dysfunction; neuropathic orofacial pains, such as trigeminal neuralgia and deafferentation pain (a.k.a atypical odontalgia); Headache management, including tension-type, migraine, paroxysmal hemicrania, cluster and other autonomic cephalalgias. Dr. Nixdorf is a member of the FPA Medical Advisory Board.

Dr. Pilitsis is Professor of Neurosurgery and Chairman of Department of Neuroscience and Experimental Therapeutics at Albany Medical College. To date, she has served as Chair of the Joint Section on Pain of the American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANS)/Congress of Neurological Surgeons (CNS) as well as AANS/CNS Chair of Joint Section for Women in Neurosurgery. She is currently an Executive Council Member of the American Society for Stereotactic and Functional Neurosurgery, Scientific Program for the AANS. Dr. Pilitsis serves as section editor of functional neurosurgery in Operative Neurosurgery, is on the editorial board of Neuromodulation, is on the FDA review panel for neurological devices and sits on multiple NIH study sections. Dr. Pilitsis is a newly elected member of the FPA Medical Advisory Board.

Jennifer Wagner, LPN, ASN, BS, is the Director of Clinical Research at Pain Research of Oregon and the Executive Director of the Western Pain Society. Jennifer’s passion for pain management and policy have also led her to take an active role on both the state and national level. She lectures frequently on a variety of pain management topics including pain policy and legal issues, opioid guidelines, brain neuroplasticity and pain. Jennifer was the recipient of the 2012 OHSU Pain Awareness Award and the American Academy of Pain Medicine’s Presidential Commendation in 2010.

Dr. Casey is Chief of Neurosurgery at Oakwood Southshore Hospital in Michigan,
Associate Professor at Michigan State University and current member and former
chairman of the FPA Medical Advisory Board. Dr. Casey is co-author of "Striking
Back" the trigeminal neuralgia and face pain handbook. He is currently developing
new techniques involving transcranial magnetic stimulators, infrared light and topical
therapies.

Michele Cohen, LCSW, FIPA., Certificate in Adult Psychoanalysis, Contemporary Freudian Society,Faculty and Supervisor, Metropolitan Institute for Training in Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy, AdultProgram. Faculty and Supervisor, Contemporary Freudian Society. Training and Supervising Analyst, Contemporary Freudian Society. Member, Contemporary Freudian Society, American Psychoanalytic Association, International Psychoanalytic Association, NASW.

Jeffrey Fogel, MD is an FPA board member and TN patient. Prior to retirement he was a board certified Pediatrician and fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics. He was a contributing author to a number of medical publications and lead investigator on several research projects on pediatric health issues. Jeffrey is an expert on medical marijuana and helped craft the Pennsylvania legislation legalizing the use of medical marijuana in the state.

Anne Ciemnecki is retired from a 35-year career with Mathematica Policy Research in Princeton. As a Senior Fellow she directed many of the organization’s large-scale surveys and healthcare studies. Anne is a third generation TN patient following the paths of her mother and grandmother. Her own battle against an atypical form of TN began 22 years ago.

Hossein Ansari, MD, is a board-certified neurologist and certified headache specialist who specializes in diagnosing and treating headaches and facial pain. He is highly experienced in caring for people with migraines, “cluster" headaches and trigeminal neuralgia. Dr. Ansari’s clinical expertise also includes developing guidelines for managing headaches in the emergency room, trigeminal neuropathy, Botox administration and nerve blocks and sphenopalatine ganglion (SPG) block procedures for head/face pain, and neurological problems resulting from systemic disease. Dr. Ansari is a fellow of both the American Academy of Neurology (FAAN) and the American Headache Society (FAHS). He is an active member of numerous professional societies, including the International Headache Society, where he serves on the advisory council.

Sharona Ben-Haim, MD, is a neurosurgeon who specializes in caring for people with treatment-resistant epilepsy, chronic pain including facial pain and trigeminal neuralgia, spasticity, and movement disorders such as Parkinson’s disease, dystonia and essential tremor. She performs deep brain stimulation (DBS) surgeries, including "awake" microelectrode-guided DBS and "asleep" MRI- and CT-guided DBS. Dr. Ben-Haim has been invited to present nationally on topics including risk factors for hemorrhage during deep brain stimulation and occupational hazards in neurosurgical training. She also serves as a neurotrauma consultant to the NFL. She completed a fellowship in epilepsy and functional surgery at Yale School of Medicine in New Haven, Connecticut, and was a visiting fellow in functional neurosurgery at University of Oxford in Oxford, England.

Ramesh Babu, MD is a neurosurgeon specializing in micro surgery of spine and brain and skull base surgery and trigeminal neuralgia and hemifacial spasm. Dr Babu has extensive training and experience in treating various kinds of Cranial Nerve Compression Syndromes including Hemi Facial Spasms and Glossopharyngeal Neuralgia. Dr. Babu is also a member of TNA’s Board of Directors.

Dr. Zimmerman's expertise has been recognized nationally and internationally, and he serves on the medical advisory boards of the Epilepsy Foundation and the Facial Pain Association. As a professor of neurosurgery, he knows the importance of educating the physicians of the future, and Dr. Zimmerman chairs the Mayo Clinic Education Committee and serves as medical director of education. He has focused his patient-centered clinical practice on the surgical options to treat severe facial pain (trigeminal neuralgia) and microsurgical treatment of hemifacial spasm.

Dr. Linskey is Professor of Neurosurgery at University of California Irvine and Western Regional Director of the Medical Advisory Boardof the Facial Pain Association. Dr.Linskey’s clinical interests encompass brain and spine arteriovenous malformation, cerebral aneurysm, cranial nerve disorders, gamma knife stereotactic
radiosurgery, trigeminal neuralgia, glossopharyngeal neuralgia, hemifacial spasm, skull base
microsurgery and microvascular decompression surgery. Dr. Linskey has authored or co-authored more than one hundred peer reviewed articles.

Dr. Schuster is a board-certified neurologist and pain and headache
specialist. He sees people with all types of chronic pain, with a
special focus on spine pain and headache. Dr. Schuster’s research interests include biomarker
research and personalized medicine in pain disorders including new daily persistent headache, chronic migraine, trigeminal neuralgia, multiple sclerosis, spine pain, and lumbar radiculopathy(the condition often called “sciatica"). He has received research awards from the American Medical Association and the American Headache Society.

Mark S. Wallace, MD, is a Professor of Clinical Anesthesiology and Chief of the Division of Pain Medicine, Department of Anesthesiology at UCSD. He is also the Director of Clinical Research, Clinical and Translational Research Institute at UCSD. Dr. Wallace has been studying cannabis and its use for chronic pain for nearly two decades.