Abstract
Encouraging females in the headache field
When I was a biology student and later as a young doctor, neurogenetic diseases such as Duchenne muscular dystrophy intrigued me. Coincidentally, I started genetic research in migraine and during my neurology training I further realised that headache is one of the most frequent neurological disorders and one of the few for which a neurologist can do more than just diagnose a patient. Thanks to my mentors Michel Ferrari, neurologist, and Rune Frants, neurogeneticist, I was able to further develop my translational interest in the international headache field. Now, my main focus is on translational headache research, and my main goals are to further stimulate young doctors to provide good care for headache patients and young researchers to open new avenues in the search for new treatment strategies.
It is a privilege to serve with my colleagues on the Board of Trustees of the International Headache Society (IHS) to advance research, education, and patient care in headache medicine. I believe that it is extremely important that young scientists in the field of headache build new networks with each other and that the IHS promote collaborations between various disciplines and between clinicians and basic scientists. Meetings of the IHS and the Headache Master School are excellent opportunities to educate young people, inspire them, and encourage them to play a role as future Headache Masters. Furthermore, we should help to further increase awareness on the impact of headache on our societies, especially in those countries where this is lagging behind. It is my personal goal to encourage female scientists and doctors to devote their strength and ideas to headache research to increase female potential for future leadership.
Gisela Terwindt
Department of Neurology, Leiden University Medical Centre, Leiden, The Netherlands
Email:
Promoting better communication between IHS and the national societies
After completing my neurological training and doctor of medicine thesis with Prof James W. Lance in Sydney, Australia, it was somewhat inevitable that I would choose to devote most of my clinical and research life to headache. Indeed, I was a founding member of the Australian Headache Society (AHS) in 1986 and have been a member of the IHS since 1988. After returning from Queen’s Square, London (having just followed Peter Goadsby there), I took over responsibility for our research laboratories and began a long and productive collaboration with Dr Geoffrey Lambert. While the AHS was initially very active, primarily in the education of medical students, general practitioners and neurologists, in the years after the retirement of Profs Lance and Michael Anthony and Peter Goadsby’s move back to London, the society began to gradually wind down. However, in more recent times with the emergence of young neurologists with a keen interest in headache in Australia and New Zealand and with the encouragement of members of IHS (AR, DD and PJG), I set about to ‘rejuvenate’ the old AHS and hence, the Australian and New Zealand Headache Society was born in 2014, and I was honoured to be its inaugural president. It was then a singular privilege to be asked to become a member of the Board of Trustees of IHS in 2015. In that capacity I see one of my roles as promoting better communication between IHS and the national societies (particularly in Australasia but also in Southeast Asia, building on the great work of the ARCH initiative started by others) and emphasising the mutual benefits to be gained by all in this relationship.
Alessandro S Zagami
The Institute of Neurological Sciences, Prince of Wales Hospital, Sydney, Australia
Email: