Plenary Speakers
Louis De Beaumont, Ph.D.
Louis De Beaumont, Ph.D. is a certified neuropsychologist and full researcher at the Montreal Sacred Heart Trauma Center. He currently holds the University of Quebec research Chair on the neurobiology of mild traumatic brain injury. Dr De Beaumont conducted seminal studies on the long term and cumulative effects of sports concussions and has gained international recognition for his work on the interaction of age and sports concussion on brain integrity. He did his doctoral training under the supervision of Maryse Lassonde at the University of Montreal and later joined Judes Poirier’s Neurobiology of Aging laboratory during his post-doctoral fellowship at McGill University. Among dozens of distinctions, Dr De Beaumont received the 2010 Governor General of Canada Gold medal for academic merit at the graduate level and two of his recent discoveries as an independent researcher are listed among Quebec’s Top 10 scientific discoveries of the year for 2014.
Hillary Hawkins, M.D.
Hillary Hawkins, M.D. joined Sheltering Arms in 1993 and has been Medical Director at Sheltering Arms Hospital - Hanover since 2009. She specializes in inpatient rehabilitation as well as rehabilitation services for women, with particular emphasis on pelvic pain and pain associated with pregnancy. Her other areas of clinical expertise and interest include sports injuries, osteoporosis, non-operative orthopedic conditions and rehabilitation of neurological conditions, including stroke and brain injury. A native of Richmond, VA, Dr. Hawkins received her undergraduate degree in Physical Therapy from Georgia State University and earned her medical degree and completed her residency at the Medical College of Virginia.
Dr. Hawkins has given numerous presentations in the areas of pelvic and myofascial pain, fibromyalgia and pain during pregnancy. She serves as an Associate Clinical Professor in the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation at Virginia Commonwealth University Health System, and is also a member of a number of organizations including the American Academy of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, American Medical Association, Richmond Academy of Medicine and Medical Society of Virginia. In addition to her professional interests and activities, Dr. Hawkins enjoys running, hiking with her dogs, gardening, traveling and skiing. She has been married to her husband, Jim Hawkins, with whom she has three children, for over 30 years.
Richard Kendall, D.O.
Richard Kendall, D.O. is the Chief of the Division of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation at the University of Utah. He holds board certifications from The American Board of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation with a sub-specialty certification in pain management. Dr. Kendall's focus is on rehabilitation treatments and diagnosis of back and neck pain using interventional spine procedures, electrodiagnositic testing and therapies. He has special interest in back and neck pain in the cyclist and triathlete, and musculoskeletal rehabilitation.
Anne McKee, M.D.
Anne McKee, M.D. is a Professor of Neurology and Pathology and Director of the Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy Center at the Boston University School of Medicine. She is Director of VA-BU-SLI Brain Bank and Director of Brain Banks for the Alzheimer Disease Center and Framingham Heart Study, and Director of the VISN-1 Neuropathology Laboratory for the New England VA Medical Centers. Dr. McKee is also Neuropathologist for the National VA ALS Brain Bank and National PTSD Brain Bank. Dr. McKee is a board certified neurologist and neuropathologist with extensive experience in neurodegenerative disease, particularly in traumatic brain injury and its long-term consequence, chronic traumatic encephalopathy. Dr. McKee serves on the Medical Advisory Board for the Sports Legacy Institute and the Mackey White Traumatic Brain Injury Committee for the National Football League Players' Association. She serves as an elected member of the Dana Alliance for Brain Initiatives and the National Academies’ (National Research Council’s) Panel on Human Research and Engineering at the Army Research Laboratory. Dr. McKee has been the keynote speaker for multiple conferences and international organizations. Dr. McKee has also has received numerous awards for her research including the Cleveland Neuroscience Research Award, the Career Investigator Development Award, sponsored by the National Institute of Neurological and Communicative Disorders and Stroke, multiple Moore Awards from the American Association of Neuropathologists, multiple Merit Awards from the Department of Veterans Affairs, and the 2012 Impact Award from the Sports Legacy Institute.
Christopher McNeil, Ph.D.
Christopher McNeil, Ph.D. is an Assistant Professor in the School of Health and Exercise Sciences at the Okanagan campus of The University of British Columbia in Kelowna. He completed a PhD at Western University (formerly The University of Western Ontario) in London under the supervision of Dr. Charles Rice followed by a postdoctoral fellowship at Neuroscience Research Australia (formerly Prince of Wales Medical Research Institute) in Sydney under the supervision of Prof. Simon Gandevia and Dr. Janet Taylor.
Dr. McNeil’s research is directed at describing and understanding neuromuscular function using a systems level approach in humans. The approach focuses on elucidating the relationship between neural control and muscle function during static and dynamic contractions. Main techniques include isometric and dynamic muscle function (i.e., strength and power), electromyography, transcranial magnetic stimulation and percutaneous electrical stimulation of the corticospinal tract and peripheral nervous system. Models used to explore questions in this field include aging and fatigue.
Rodolfo Savica, M.D.
Rodolfo Savica, M.D. is a clinical faculty of Sleep and Movement Disorders Division within the Department of Neurology. He completed a movement disorders fellowship, a behavioral fellowship and a DBS fellowship at the Mayo Clinic, Rochester. His training and experience have been focused on evaluation and management of movement disorders and dementias. His main clinical interest is devoted to patients affected by Parkinsonism, tremors and Dementia with Lewy Bodies. He is the director of the Dementia with Lewy Bodies/Parkinson disease Dementia clinic, one of the few clinics in the United States that are focused on this group of patients.In addition, his practice includes the use of botulin toxin injections to treat dystonias and movement disorders as well as the electrophysiological analysis of movement disorders.
Kristine Yaffe, M.D.
Kristine Yaffe, M.D. attended Yale University for her undergraduate degree, received her medical degree at the University of Pennsylvania, and completed residencies in Neurology and Psychiatry at the University of California, San Francisco. She is a Professor of Psychiatry, Neurology and Epidemiology, the Roy and Marie Scola Endowed Chair and Vice Chair of Research in Psychiatry at UCSF. She is also the Chief of Geriatric Psychiatry and Director of the Memory Evaluation Clinic at the San Francisco Veterans Affairs Medical Center. In both her research, clinical work, and mentoring, she has directed her efforts towards improving the care of patients with cognitive disorders and other geriatric neuropsychiatric conditions.
Dr. Yaffe serves on the Beeson Scientific Advisory Committee, the Council of the German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases, and Alzheimer's Association Medical & Scientific Advisory Council. She is also the Co-Chair of the Institute of Medicine’s Committee on the Public Health Dimensions of Cognitive Aging. As the current principal investigator of 8 NIH grants as well as several other DOD and foundation grants, Dr. Yaffe's research focuses on the epidemiology of cognitive aging and late life depression. In addition to publishing over 300 peer-reviewed articles (H-index=85) in numerous prestigious journals including the Lancet, BMJ, JAMA, and NEJM, Dr. Yaffe also edited a book published by Oxford Press, “Chronic Medical Disease and Cognitive Aging: Toward a Healthy Body and Brain.” In 2014, she was recognized as one of Thomas Reuters World’s Most Influential Scientific Minds and honored by the American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry with the Distinguished Scientist Award.