The IU School of Medicine Department of Neurological Surgery continues to the broaden its scope in providing world-class clinical care and research with the addition of three new neurosurgeon-scientists who bring a wealth of specialized training to the Department and the citizens of Indiana and the region.
Angela Richardson, MD, PhD, and Jignesh Tailor, MD, PhD, joined the Department on August 1 and Amanda Saratsis, MD, began her new role on September 1.
“We are very excited to have Drs. Richardson, Tailor and Saratsis join our team,” said Department Chair Shelly D. Timmons, MD, PhD. Together with existing neurooncology laboratory researchers in our department, including pediatric neurosurgeon Karl Balsara, MD, and post-doctoral associate Nuri Damayanti, PhD, as well as numerous collaborators across campus, this group will further new knowledge on how brain tumors develop in search of more effective treatments and cures.”
Richardson, assistant professor of Neurological Surgery, joined the team of multidisciplinary neurooncology specialists and will create an independent research laboratory focusing on gene therapy and oncolytic virotherapy strategies for the treatment of adult and pediatric brain tumors. She recently completed a Cerebrovascular/Skull Base Fellowship at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, which followed her neurosurgery residency training and Surgical Neuro-Oncology fellowship at the University of Miami. Richardson earned her MD/PhD in Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics from Drexel University College of Medicine in Philadelphia and her undergraduate degree from Columbia University.
Tailor, assistant professor of Neurological Surgery, joined the pediatric neurosurgery team and will also develop an independent laboratory focusing on neural stem cells and the origin of childhood brain tumors that are thought to arise from progenitors of the developing brain. Tailor comes to IU after completing fellowship training in Pediatric Neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins University Hospital in Baltimore. He received his medical degree from the University of Oxford Medical School and holds a PhD in Stem Cell Biology from the University of Cambridge. During neurosurgery training in London, Tailor received a highly competitive Wellcome Trust Post-Doctoral Research Award that allowed him to a complete neurosurgery fellowship at the University of Toronto while doing postdoctoral research at the Hospital for Sick Kids in Toronto.
Completing the trio of new specialists is Saratsis, an assistant professor of Neurological Surgery and pediatric neurosurgeon, who specializes in the treatment of congenital disorders of the brain and spine, such as chiari malformation and occult spinal dysraphism, as well as the surgical treatment of pediatric seizures and brain disorders. Her research focuses on identifying molecular markers and novel therapeutic targets in pediatric brain tumors for tumor subtyping and stratification to targeted treatments.
Saratsis completed her neurosurgery residency at Georgetown University Hospital in Washington, DC. She was a Research Fellow at the Children’s Research Institute in Washington DC, as well as a Clinical Fellow in the Department of Pediatric Surgery at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. She received her medical degree from University of Illinois at Chicago and her undergraduate degree from Northwestern University.
“These neurosurgeon-scientists bring a great deal of clinical acumen to the care of patients will neurosurgical diseases and injuries of all types, and are a welcome addition to our clinical neurosurgery teams,” Timmons added.
