Abstract
Driving headache education worldwide
I currently work as a Neurologist/Professor at the Hull York Medical School and Hull University Teaching Hospitals. I qualified from Dow Medical College, Karachi, Pakistan, in 1986 and moved to the United Kingdom following residency. I received clinical training at St James’s University Hospital, Leeds, and Imperial College of Medicine, London, where I received clinical and research training in headache disorders at the Princess Margaret Migraine Clinic. As a full time clinician, I served in the field of headache for 28 years and contributed towards headache research, management and education. I served as clinical director in Neurosciences for 10 years (2002–2012) during which I completed an MBA with distinction in public sector management from the University of Hull and was awarded the postgraduate certificate in medical education (PGCME) from Hull York Medical School (2015).
I established the Hull Headache clinic (1996), which provides tertiary care in headache disorders. Our clinical research focuses on ways to improve the diagnosis of cluster headache (CH) and the treatment of chronic migraine. We have the largest cohort of patients treated with botulinum toxin (BT) over the last 10 years and have explored the long-term outcome of this treatment. My research group seeks to establish clinical tools for making an early diagnosis of CH, acknowledging the impact of this condition on patients’ quality of life. I have been a Chief Investigator in many clinical trials (Phase 2,3 and 4) involving BT, Calcitonin Gene Related Peptide (CGRP) antagonist and Monoclonal Antibody (MAB).
I work very closely with patient and professional headache organisations. I am a Trustee of the Migraine Trust (MT), Educational Officer for the British Association for the Study of Headache (BASH), member of the headache advisory group for Association of British Neurologist (ABN), director of Migraine Trust International Symposium (MTIS) and served on National Institute for health and Care and Excellence (NICE) and British Association for the Study of Headache (BASH) committees in the development of headache guidelines. Working in collaboration for the MT and BASH, I have organised UK nationwide meetings on headache since 2005 and with the International Headache Society (IHS), teaching courses at the International Headache Congress (IHC). I have been invited to deliver teaching in Denmark, Sri-Lanka, Pakistan, South Korea and Iran. I have previously served as a co-opted trustee of the IHS, Chair of BASH and Headache UK.
I would bring headache education to the forefront of the IHS agenda and, building on my clinical, administrative and managerial experience, I would contribute to the IHS global effort in achieving its mission to advance headache science, education and management and promote headache awareness worldwide.
Department of Neurology, Hull Royal Infirmary, Hull, UK.
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Accessible and applicable headache science
Currently working as a Neurologist in Mersin University School of Medicine Department of Neurology, I am also actively working as a clinician in the Headache Outpatient and Child & Adolescent Headache Policlinic, cooperating with the Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. While I was practising my residency in neurology, I also pursued education in the sub-branch of headaches. In 2000, working together with the Department of Public Health, I organized and managed a fieldwork study consisting of 5562 children and adolescents, resulting in a few papers subsequently recognized as some of the most comprehensive and widely referenced paediatric headache publications containing face-to-face data. Later in 2003, I became a member of the International Headache Society (IHS). In 2004, during the 6th Children and Adolescent Congress, I was accepted into the Paediatric Committee. In this period, the insightful counsel of Professor Çiçek Wöber Bingöl and Professor Vincenzo Guidetti made the path I was to take clearer. In 2008, I was the Chairwoman of the 7th Children and Adolescent Headache Congress in Istanbul and in 2019 the Children and Adolescent Headache Winter School in Mersin. I worked for the European Headache Federation on the Guide for children and adolescent headache diagnosis and treatment. The book Headache in children and adolescents; a case-based approach, edited by myself and Ishaq Abu Arafeh, was awarded “Highly Commended” by the British Medical Association. In 2010, I was invited to join the IHS Classification Committee and assigned to restructure paediatric classifications in relevant chapters. I also brought forward and organized the Turkish Headache Database project, which has been an active database since 2004. Since 2015, I have been an active member of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) Headache Chapter. To date the Chapter has held three international meetings, with the upcoming 4th MENA and 2nd Turkish African Headache Congress to be held from 28–31 October 2020 in Antalya, Turkey. In this context, I have been working in order to make headache science applicable and more available not only for doctors, but also for the general population. Even though I am primarily working in the children and adolescent headache field, I love looking at the same cases from the different perspective of other fields, such as epidemiology, statistics, public health, computer sciences and genetics. I have always believed that academicians should help societies better their future and have worked with and been a leader to many non-governmental organizations on headache and dementia. In order to raise societal awareness regarding headache, I wrote two public, not-for-profit books. With my knowledge in clinical fieldwork, and in light of the scientific literature, I want to introduce the multidisciplinary and multicultural approach into the mentioned fields and promote accessibility and applicability into headache science around the world through my position as an IHS Co-opted Trustee, to which I am honoured to have been appointed in 2019. I firmly believe that the better we know the fieldwork, the better results we will get in laboratories.
Professor of Neurology, Algology and Clinical Neurophysiology, Mersin University School of Medicine, Mersin, Turkey.
Board Member of International Headache Society for 2019–2021.
Executive Member of IHS Pediatric Special Interest Group since 2004.
President of Alzheimer Society Mersin Branch and Dementia Special Care Center, Mersin, Turkey since 2006.
President of Global Migraine and Pain Summit.
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