The ANZAN 2010 Annual Scientific Meeting will cover a diverse range of neurology with an international flavour, including MS, Epilepsy, neuromuscular diseases, neurogenetics, medical training and neurology workforce. International speakers are : Alastair Compston, Stephen Sergay, Hugh Bostock, Greg Worrell.

International Speakers

• Professor Alastair Compston, University of Cambridge
• Professor Hugh Bostock, University College London
• Dr Stephen Sergay, Tampa Neurology Associates
• Dr Greg Worrell, Mayo Clinic

Speakers

• Prof Edward Byrne, Monash University
• Prof Garth Nicholson, University of Sydney
• Prof Helmut Butzkueven, The University of Melbourne
• Prof Stephen Davis, The University of Melbourne
• Prof Martin Delatycki, Austin Health
• Prof Malcolm Horne, The University of Melbourne
• Prof Terence O'Brien, The Royal Melbourne Hospital, The University of Melbourne
• Prof Elsdon Storey, Monash University
• Professor Arun Krishnan, University of New South Wales (Leonard Cox Lecture)

Professor Hugh Bostock, University College London

Hugh Bostock is Emeritus Professor of Neurophysiology at the Institute of Neurology, University College London. After graduating in chemistry at Oxford, he moved to UCL, where he obtained his Ph.D. in neurophysiology, and then to the Sobell Department at the Institute of Neurology in Queen Square. He was awarded a personal chair by UCL in 1996, elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 2001, and awarded the Grey Walter Medal of the British Society of Clinical Neurophysiologists in 2009. His research has mainly been concerned with how the electrical properties of axons depend on the different ion channels in the nodal and internodal membrane, and their changes in disease. About 20 years ago, the focus of this work shifted from animal models to non-invasive recordings in humans, and with Australian colleagues he has recently revived nerve excitability testing as a clinical tool for studying membrane function in patients.

Professor Alastair Compston, University of Cambridge

Alastair Compston is Professor of Neurology, Head of the Department of Clinical Neurosciences in the University of Cambridge, and co-chairman of Cambridge Neuroscience. He qualified from the Middlesex Hospital Medical School (UCL) in 1971, and trained in neurology at the National Hospital, Queen Square. Appointed as consultant neurologist to the University Hospital of Wales in 1982, and professor of neurology in the University of Wales from 1988, he moved to Cambridge in 1989 where he is a professorial fellow of Jesus College. Alastair Compston is president of the Association of British Neurologists (2009-2010); Editor of Brain (from 2004); and, amongst other elections, a Foundation Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences, Foreign Member of the National Academy of Sciences of Germany and former president of the European Neurological Society. His research focuses on the clinical science of human demyelinating disease with contributions to the genetic epidemiology, immunology and neurobiology, and treatment and repair of multiple sclerosis. Alastair Compston is author of more than 650 publications, and editor of McAlpine's Multiple Sclerosis. He received the Sobek Foundation International Research Prize (2002) and the Charcot Award of Multiple Sclerosis International Federation (2007) for contributions to the study of multiple sclerosis. Amongst other named lectures, he has delivered the Langdon Brown (1989), Croonian (2004), Bradshaw (2007) and Fitzpatrick (2010) Lectures of the Royal College of Physicians of London.

Dr Stephen Sergay, Tampa Neurology Associates

Dr. Sergay was born in South Africa and received his medical training at the Witwatersrand University Medical School in Johannesburg where he also served his internship. He completed his neurology residency training at the Harvard Longwood Program in Boston and subsequently served as a neurologist at the Lahey Clinic Foundation in Boston and was an instructor in Neurology at Harvard Medical School before moving to Tampa, Florida in 1980. He is a diplomat of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology. He was Medical Director of the Neurodiagnostic Laboratory at Tampa General Hospital from 1984 to 1998. He has been President of the American Academy of Neurology (2007-2009) and is currently on the Board as Past President, and is a Trustee on the Board of the American Academy of Neurology Foundation. He has previously served the Academy in several positions, including Chair of Strategic Planning and as Director of American Academy of Neurology Enterprises, Inc. and has been the recipient of the American Academy of Neurology Presidential Award of Recognition. He has chaired the United Council for Neurologic Subspecialties. He has served the World Federation of Neurology as the U.S. delegate, and has been the WFN Regional Director for North America and has served on its Education Executive Committee. Dr. Sergay is married and has three daughters.

Dr Greg Worrell, Mayo Clinic

Gregory A. Worrell received his Ph.D. in Physics from Case Western Reserve University and M.D. from University of Texas, Galveston. He completed his Neurology and Epilepsy training at Mayo Clinic, where he is now Associate Professor of Neurology. He is a member of the IEEE, American Neurological Association, Academy of Neurology, and American Epilepsy Society.

His research is integrated with a clinical practice focused on patients with medically resistant epilepsy. The current focus of his research is the use of large-scale system electrophysiology, brain stimulation, and data mining to identify and track electrophysiological biomarkers of epileptic brain and seizure generation.

Prof Edward Byrne, Monash University

(EG Robertson Lecture)

Professor Byrne has had an active career in clinical neurology and basic neurological research. He received his MBBS with first class honours from the University of Tasmania in 1974 and moved to Adelaide the following year, becoming Neurology Registrar in 1977. During the years 1980 - 1982, he was the Muscular Dystrophy Research Fellow at Queen Square in London. In 1983, he returned to Australia as the Director of Neurology at St Vincent's Hospital Melbourne and from 1992, was Professor/Director.
Ed was awarded the degree of Doctor of Science from the University of Melbourne in 1995. He was the Founding Director of the Melbourne Neuromuscular Research Institute and the Founding Director of the Centre for Neuroscience and Professor of Experimental Neurology at the University of Melbourne. As Director of the Centre for Neuroscience, he played a major role in driving the establishment of Neurosciences Victoria and Neurosciences Australia. He is a Board member of BUPA Pty and Cochlear Pty Ltd and immediate past Editor-in-Chief of the Internal Medicine Journal.

He is a member of the Neuromuscular Steering Group of the World Federation of Neurology. He was Secretary General and Chair of the program committee of the 9^th International Neuromuscular Congress. He has served as a Governor of BHP Billiton Charitable Trustees and Board Member of Baker Heart Research Institute, Prince Henry's Institute of Medical Science, McFarlane Burnet Centre for Medical Research, Monash Institute of Medical Research and Southern Health. He was awarded the Queen's Square prize for Neurological Research (1982), the Bethlehem Griffiths Research Medal (2003) and the Sir Louis Pyke Award for contribution to Multiple Sclerosis (2004). He was awarded an Officer of the Order of Australia in the 2006 Australia Day Honours List. Professor Byrne was Dean of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences at Monash University then Executive Dean of Biomedicine, University College London and Head of the Royal Free University College Medical School and Vice Provost at University College London. He commenced at Monash University as Vice-Chancellor and President on 6 July 2009.

Prof Garth Nicholson, University of Sydney

(MJ Eadie Lecture)

Professor Garth Nicholson, is professor of molecular biology and neurogenetics at the University of Sydney. He is director of the Department of Molecular Medicine at Concord Hospital and scientific director of the Northcott Neurobiology Laboratory at the ANZAC Research Institute. His research group specializes in finding the molecular causes of neurodegenerative disorders of the spinal cord and peripheral nerve. His laboratory has been responsible for locating the gene defects in many neuropathies, with publications in leading international scientific journals. His laboratory first found the chromosomal location of hereditary sensory neuropathy (HSN1) and later found the mutated gene. In 2006 his laboratory first showed that TDP-43, a protein that accumulates in dying motor neurones, was mutated in familial motor neurone disease (MND or ALS) and is therefore likely to be part of the cause of MND. As a result of these discoveries he has established new methods for the diagnosis and management of these diseases. He has assisted the establishment of patient support groups. He is now testing a new therapy for HSN1 based on the specific defect in cell biology caused by HSN1 mutations.

Prof Helmut Butzkueven, The University of Melbourne

H Butzkueven is a Multiple Sclerosis Neurologist at the Royal Melbourne Hospital and Director of MS services at Box Hill Hospital. He is a Senior Research Fellow at the Florey Institute and an Honorary Associate Professor in the Centre for Neuroscience, University of Melbourne. His basic science research interest is the characterization of molecular and cellular CNS responses to autoimmune injury in animal models of MS. He leads a number of human studies, particularly focusing on large-scale MS epidemiology, development of new biomarkers for axonal degeneration in MS and understanding the effects of MS risk genes.
Since 2005, he has been chief investigator of the international MSBasis study (MS incident cohort study (50 MS centres, 22 countries, 2110patients) and, since 2004, the Chairman of the MSBase Foundation (www.msbase.org) providing a seminal contribution to this global online MS cohort study with more than 13500 patients enrolled (54 centres, 27 countries). He is currently supervising a research team of 12 people including research assistants, graduate students, a research officer and clinical fellows.

Prof Stephen Davis, The University of Melbourne

Professor Stephen Davis is Professor of Neurology at the University of Melbourne, Director of Neurosciences at The Royal Melbourne Hospital and Head, Comprehensive Stroke Centre at the Royal Melbourne Hospital. He is the current President of the Australian and New Zealand Association of Neurologists and a Past-President of the Stroke Society of Australasia. He was the first co-chair of the Australasian Stroke Trials network and has extensive experience in stroke trials. He is a board member of the World Stroke Association, an Associate Editor for the journals Stroke and Cerebrovascular Diseases. He was given the MJ Eadie Award in 2004 by the Australian and New Zealand Association of Neurologists for career achievements in Neuroscience research. He was given the Minister's award for outstanding individual achievement in the Victorian Public Healthcare awards in 2008. He holds an NHMRC program grant in stroke, has co-authored 3 books, numerous chapters and over 300 peer-reviewed papers. His major research interests are clinical trials in acute stroke therapies, stroke prevention trials and the use of neuroimaging in the selection of acute treatments.

Prof Martin Delatycki, Austin Health

Professor Martin Delatycki is a consultant clinical geneticist at Austin Health and is Director of the Bruce Lefroy Centre at the Murdoch Childrens Research Institute. Martin has clinical and research interests in neurogenetics. He is co-director of the Friedreich ataxia clinic at Monash Medical Centre and has an active research program in this disorder that has resulted in over 20 publications. He also has an active research program in Huntington disease.

Prof Malcolm Horne, The University of Melbourne

Malcolm Horne is Deputy Director of the Florey Neurosciences Institute and a consultant Neurologist specialising in Parkinson's Disease at the St. Vincent's Hospital in Melbourne. His research inte rests relate to various facets of Parkinson's Disease and Motor Neurone Disease. These include studies into the cause of PD including genetics, the repair of the brain damaged by PD, measuring PD and the normal and disordered function of dopamine in the brain. Interest in MND relate to how molecules such as SOD1 and TDP-43 are pathogenic in PD.

Prof Terence O'Brien, The Royal Melbourne Hospital, The University of Melbourne

Terence O'Brien (MBBS Melb. MD Melb. FRACP) is The James Stewart Professor of Medicine and Head of The Department of Medicine, The Royal Melbourne and Western Hospitals. He is also Head of the Epilepsy Program and consultant neurologist at The Royal Melbourne Hospital. He leads a large translational research team undertaking both basic studies, involving animal models, and clinical studies. He is a specialist in both neurology and clinical pharmacology, with particular expertise in epilepsy, anti-epileptic drugs and in-vivo imaging in animals models and humans. He did his clinical and research training at St. Vincent's and Royal Melbourne Hospitals in Melbourne, and then the Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota, USA (1995-1998). He has published approximately 150 peer-reviewed original papers in leading neurological, pharmacological and imaging journals, over 500 abstracts and 10 book chapters.

Prof Elsdon Storey, Monash University

Professor Storey was appointed as Professor of Neuroscience at Monash University (Alfred Hospital campus), Director of the Van Cleef Roet Centre for Nervous Diseases, and Head of the Neurology Unit, Alfred Hospital in 1996. He commenced clinical neurology training in the UK and completed it in Melbourne, before undertaking postdoctoral studies in the neurochemistry of Huntington's disease at Massachusetts General Hospital, where his interests in neurogenetics and behavioural neurology were kindled. He returned to Australia in 1991 to work on Alzheimer's disease with Professor Colin Masters. He started neurogenetics clinics at RMH and St. Vincent's (expanded to the Alfred in 1996), and has been Neurologist to the Memory Clinic at Caulfield Hospital since 1997. He is a Neurology Co-Editor of the Journal of Clinical Neuroscience and a Board Member of Neurosciences Victoria and the Bethlehem Griffiths Foundation.

Prof Arun Krishnan, University of New South Wales

(Leonard Cox Lecture)

Arun Krishnan is Senior lecturer in Neuroscience at the Translational Neuroscience Facility, University of New South Wales and Consultant Neurologist at Prince of Wales Hospital in Sydney. After completing his clinical training in Neurology, he undertook further training in clinical and research neurophysiology, under the guidance of Professor Matthew Kiernan. He has received a number of research awards including the ANZAN Young Investigator Prize in 2003 and the J.G Golseth Young Investigator Prize of the American Academy of Neuromuscular and Electrodiagnostic Medicine in 2004. In 2006-7 he was appointed as the ANZAN Overseas Fellow to Queen Square and returned to Australia to take up an NHMRC Career Development Award at the Prince of Wales Medical Research Institute. His major area of research interest is in the investigation of ion channel dysfunction in neurological disease, with a particular focus on metabolic neuropathies.

Awards & Lectures

Awards

James McLeod Advanced Trainee Award
Must be current Neurology Registrar

James Lance Young Investigator Award
PhD student

There is an award each for Poster and Platform in each category.

Leonard Cox Award:
The Leonard Cox Award is open to ANZAN members who received their Full membership within the last ten years. For the 2010 award this means that the candidate must have attained their membership (and FRACP or equivalent) in May 2000 or later and have produced a significant body of scientific work. The application is by submission of a curriculum vitae and a description of up to two pages of the nature of their work, its scientific significance and its likely contribution to the field of neurology. The successful applicant will be chosen by the ANZAN Scientific Programme Committee and invited to present the work as a half hour lecture at the ASM.

Applications for the Leonard Cox Award should be sent to:

The Honorary Secretary
ANZAN
145 Macquarie Street
SYDNEY NSW 2000
AUSTRALIA

Lectures

E Graeme Robertson Lecture

Prof Edward Byrne, Monash University

In 1976 the Council of the Australian Association of Neurologists, as the Association was then known, decided to fund an invited annual lecture in honour of E Graeme Robertson at each Annual Scientific Meeting of the Association. The first E Graeme Robertson Lecture was given in Hobart in 1978. There was a lecture given in each subsequent year with the exception of 1998 when unforseen circumstances prevented the lecturer from giving his presentation.

Mervyn J Eadie Lecture

Prof Garth Nicholson, University of Sydney

The Mervyn J Eadie Lecture was introduced in 2001 to honour members who have made a significant contribution to the neurosciences. Prof Mervyn Eadie is a distinguished neurologist, neuropharmacologist and author in Queensland. He has contributed to the Association in many
ways, in particular as the editor of "Clinical and Experimental Neurology", and the co-author of "Neurology in Australia" and "A Directory of Neurology in Australia". Prof Eadie also wrote the "The Flowering of a Waratah - A History of Australian Neurology and of the Australian Association of Neurologists"

Ian MacDonald Lecture

Prof Alastair Compston, University of Cambridge

Ian McDonald was an outstanding academic neurologist, a true friend of many in this Association, a mentor and supporter of trainees and someone whose passing will be greatly missed by all neurologists in Australia and New Zealand. The Ian McDonald lecture has been introduced to honour his enormous contribution to world neurology, and reflect the great warmth felt towards him by so many ANZAN members.