Marjorie Soltis, MD, came to Duke in 2016 as a resident, after her neuroscience class and time working with Parkinson’s patient convinced her to pursue neurology. One residency and fellowship later, Soltis is a sleep medicine specialist and a member of our faculty. For this week’s Spotlight interview, Soltis shares her experience helping patients with sleep disorders and reflects on what she gained from our residency and fellowship programs.

The growing specialty of hospital neurology has two hallmarks: complexity and diversity. One minute a hospital neurologist may be helping a cancer patient who is having a seizure; the next, they might be treating a recovering heart attack patient who has just had a stroke. Cases like these are the bread and butter for Hospital Neurology Division Chief Matthew Luedke, MD. In this week’s Faculty Spotlight interview, Luedke talks about the joys and challenges of seeing patients across our hospital system.

Members of the Duke Neurology Department got the new year off to a fast start this January, contributing to 10 new peer-reviewed journal articles. Rick Bedlack, MD, PhD, was the senior author of three new publications investigating potential new therapies for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).

Rabia Ghazi, MBBS, first became interested in neurology when she saw how neurologists used examination findings, neuroanatomy, and clinical history to diagnose and treat complex neurological conditions. She decided to pursue movement disorders when she saw the difference deep brain stimulation (DBS) and other therapies were able to make in people’s lives. Now, she’s finishing the second of a two-year fellowship in the field, and preparing for a career that involves both clinical care and research.

As both a medical student and resident, M. Omar Subei, MD, was fascinated by the brain and the complex operations of this still largely unknown organ. Now as a second-year epilepsy fellow, Subei is refining his EEG skills, catching up on the latest advances in epilepsy literature and attending epilepsy clinic.

The Duke Neurology Department continued to grow and advance its missions of patient care, research, and training the next generation of neurology providers in 2022. Highlights from the first half of our calendar year include national and Duke-wide awards recognizing our faculty’s contributions to the field of diversity, inclusion, and neurology as a whole. The same period also saw the growth of the new Duke/UNC Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center and three of our neurologists don helmets and get in their racing care.

Our final “spotlight” of 2022 shines on Chief Resident Jung Hyun Ko, MD, MPH. Ko talks to us about becoming interested in the brain while learning how billions of neurons work together in a predictive manner to allow us to think, move, and speak. He also shares his plan for a future doing clinical and working as a neurohospitalist, how his background in epidemiology informs his perspective as a clinician, and enjoying music, video games, and time with family when he’s not at Duke.

Members of the Duke Neurology Department advanced the fields of clinical and translational neuroscience this November, contributing to 16 new peer-reviewed studies.

Thapat "Ton" Wannarong, MD, was first drawn to neuromuscular medicine as a medical student, when a neuroanatomy class revealed how the specialty allowed one to localize the case of an injury. That passion grew during Wannarong’s residency, and now he is living his dream as one of our neuromuscular fellows. In this week’s Spotlight interview, Wannarong talks to us about his hopes for providing clinical care while educating a new generation in neuromuscular medicine.

As a medical student, Shalu Bansal, MD, was drawn to family medicine, a specialty that provided opportunities to treat a variety of conditions while also getting to know her patients. While providing primary care, Bansal saw the deleterious effects sleep disorders had on her patients, and decided to pursue our sleep medicine fellowship. For this week’s Spotlight interview, Bansal talks to us about how treating sleep disorders makes a difference in the lives of her patients.