It was with sadness that the Roskamp Institute recently announced the departure of Dr. Andrew Keegan, who has directed our Clinic for over a decade and with whom we have worked for more than 15 years. While we are sad to see him go, we are pleased that he plans to pass on his knowledge and formidable patient skills to new generations of neurologists in the Department of Neurology at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston. During his time with us, Dr. Keegan has built an extensive clinical practice in this community serving many thousands of patients as well as managing our Clinical Trials division and participating in our scientific research programs. We wish him all the very best and know his patients, like us, will miss him, but look forward to continuing our collaborations with him in the coming years.
Dr. Michael Hoffmann, Clinic Medical Director
We are delighted to welcome Dr. Michael Hoffmann, longstanding collaborator and consultant to the Institute, as the new Medical Director of the Roskamp Institute Clinic. Dr. Hoffmann will work remotely from his own clinic in Winter Garden, Florida, which will become a satellite clinic for the Institute. Dr. Hoffmann is internationally recognized as an expert on the more difficult-to-diagnose (and often missed) neurological conditions which he has described in his textbook, “Cognitive, Conative and Behavioral Neurology” (Springer). Dr. Hoffmann has worked with the Roskamp Institute Clinic for 11 years and presents an engaging and enlightening monthly seminar virtually at the Institute.
Dr. Sanjay Yathiraj,
Clinical Trial Director
We are also very pleased to announce that Dr. Sanjay Yathiraj has joined the Institute as Clinical Trial Director to manage our pharmaceutical company-sponsored trials and to support our clinical research coordinators, Carole Kringel and Lance Hare. Dr. Yathiraj is a board-certified neurologist with his own practice in Bradenton and affiliations at local hospitals, including Blake Medical Center and Manatee Memorial Hospital.
Dr. Hoffmann will be seeing patients virtually and also working with our nurse practitioners Barbara Wawryszyn and Rachel Aronow, as well as supporting the Institute’s Department of Defense (DoD)- and National Institutes of Health (NIH)- sponsored clinical studies. Also involved in these studies are Dr. Laila Abdullah, Grace Bartenfelder and Dakota Helgager, who conduct clinical studies with experimental approaches derived from the Institute’s own research.
Dr. Hoffmann is also very interested in, and experienced with, novel, non-pharmacological, approaches to treat neurological diseases, such as transcranial magnetic and electric field stimulation. We anticipate the potential of introducing such approaches to our Clinic.
Dr. Yathiraj will assume Dr. Keegan’s role on the pharmaceutical clinical trials for Alzheimer’s disease, which are currently underway in our Clinic, and also has future plans to see patients at our Clinic. This critically important facet of our Clinic operations enables us to offer our patients access to the latest experimental treatments, which we expect will be expanding over the next few years as decades of research start to pay off with new drugs and other treatments that can slow or delay the disease.
Our neuropsychologist Dr. Cheryl Luis will continue her excellent work with our patients and their caregivers, as she has done for more than 15 years.
We are confident that with these changes in our clinic management, along with the continuing excellent work of all our support staff, particularly our receptionist Megan Mahoney and patient coordinator Lia Ramirez, we will to continue to provide our community with the support and resources that they have come to expect from the Roskamp Institute – to combat very challenging neurological conditions.
