ALL DOWN SYNDROME ARTICLES
Anna C.E. Hurst, MD, MS, FACMG
Medical Reviewer
Dr. Hurst is a physician for the UAB Undiagnosed Disease program, Turner syndrome clinic, and general genetics clinic, and she provides hospital consultations for inpatients at UAB and Children’s of Alabama for general genetics and inborn errors of metabolism. She also is the medical geneticist for the Smith Family Clinic for Genomic Medicine in Huntsville, Alabama.
Hurst's research focuses on expanding the availability of genomic sequencing for children with complex healthcare needs. She also has an interest in how the patient’s physical exam and facial features can be clues to a rare disease diagnosis (dysmorphology) and serves on the scientific advisory board of Facial Dysmorphology Novel Analysis. She has published over 45 peer-reviewed articles in the field of medical genetics, largely focused on the clinical delineation of rare disease phenotypes. She also serves as an associate editor for the American Journal of Medical Genetics.
Hurst is also passionate about education and serves as the program director of the UAB genetics residency programs (categorical, pediatrics-genetics, and internal medicine-genetics) and medical director of the UAB Genetic Counseling Training program. She is an officer with the Association of Professors in Human Medical Genetics.
Joy Tanaka, PhD
Medical Reviewer
Joy Tanaka, PhD, specializes in clinical molecular genetics. She is dedicated to integrating excellent clinical care with cutting-edge medical research for patients with rare and undiagnosed disorders, and is focused on pursuing questions at the interface between genetics and human disease with the goal of developing novel therapies and treatments.
Dr. Tanaka received her PhD from Yale University School of Medicine, where she was a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Medical Research Scholar and recipient of the George Robert Pfeiffer Fellowship for Translational Medicine. She completed her clinical fellowship in cytogenetics and clinical molecular genetics at Columbia University and New York Presbyterian Hospital, and is currently associate clinical laboratory director at Rady Children's Hospital Institute for Genomic Medicine in San Diego, California.
Michael R. Yochelson, MD, MBA
Medical Reviewer
Michael R. Yochelson, MD, MBA, is the chief medical officer at the Shepherd Center in Atlanta, where he was instrumental in starting its first fellowship in brain injury medicine. He is also an adjunct professor of clinical rehabilitation medicine at Emory University in Atlanta. He continues to work in the field of brain injury medicine, and he is board-certified in physical medicine and rehabilitation, neurology, and brain injury medicine.
He co-wrote and co-edited a book for patients and caregivers, Managing Brain Injury: A Guide to Living Well With Brain Injury. He has been an invited reviewer for peer-reviewed articles in Clinical Neurology & Neurosurgery, the Journal of Rehabilitation Research & Development, and Neurosurgery.
Dr. Yochelson was previously the vice president of medical affairs and chief medical officer at MedStar National Rehabilitation Hospital and the vice chair of clinical affairs for the department of rehabilitation medicine at MedStar Georgetown University Hospital, both in Washington, DC. He served as a physician in the U.S. Navy for over 11 years. From 2004 to 2006, he co-directed the mild traumatic brain injury clinical team at the National Naval Medical Center. In 2006, he took a position at MedStar National Rehabilitation Hospital as the medical director for the brain injury programs. During his tenure, he started a fellowship program in brain injury medicine, subsequently training seven physicians in the field.
He has served in several roles for the American Academy of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation and currently sits on the Inclusion and Engagement Committee. He was appointed by Congress to serve from 2014 to 2020 on the federal Advisory Committee on Prosthetics and Special Disability Programs, chairing the committee for five years. He coauthored the chapter on stroke rehabilitation in Braddom’s Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Sixth Edition.