Jose G. Romano, MD, FAHA, FAAN, FANA – Chair

Today the department has expertise in all neurological conditions centered around its clinical divisions:

• CNS/Multiple Sclerosis
• Cognitive Disorders and Alzheimer’s
• Epilepsy
• General Neurology
• Headache Disorders
• Interventional Neurology
• Movement Disorders (including Parkinson’s)
• Neurocritical Care
• Neuromuscular Disorders (including ALS)
• Neuro-Oncology
• Neuropsychology
• Pediatric Neurology
• Sleep Disorders and IOM
• Stroke
• Veterans Administration Division of Neurology

With 14 clinical offices in Palm Beach, Boca Raton, Miami, Plantation, Kendall and Coral Gables we have about 55,000 patient visits.  With major scientific advances and vast expertise, the department continues its commitment to finding a cure for neurological diseases in this generation and providing the highest quality of innovative care for neurology patients in South Florida and beyond.

Our basic, translational and clinical researchers are committed to being at the forefront of research for most neurological disorders.  The department has achieved distinction for research in Cerebral Vascular disease. Numerous Institutes and Centers of Excellence with clinical and research focuses advance and are accelerating progress toward finding a cure. The Department is home to the McKnight Brain Institute which conducts clinical and basic research in brain aging, the Brain Endowment Bank, which banks and studies the human brain affected by Parkinson’s disease and other movement disorders, drug addiction, and aging the ALS Center and the Comprehensive Center for Brain Health.

With our large residency and fellowship programs and being fully engaged in the education of medical students and master and PHD level neuroscientists, we are committed to training the next generation of clinician scientists.

Ralph L Sacco M.D., M.S., FAAN, FAHA – Chair

Dr. Ralph Sacco continued the development and expansion of the Department. It grew to more than 100 renowned research and clinical faculty in most of the neurological sub-specialties, 44 residents and 23 fellows.

Under Dr. Sacco, the Department's prestige increased. Widely recognized as an international referral center, neurologists from Latin America and all over the United States turn to Miller School faculty for expertise in solving complex neurological problems. The Department grew to 14 Divisions and the Miami Veterans Administration Neurology program.

He attracted not only excellent clinicians but also renowned neuroscientists that grew the Department's research enterprise to one of the preeminent neurological research institutions in the U.S. He created a new translational research enterprise and brought the resources that allowed the establishment of new centers and institutes including the Evelyn F. McKnight Brain Institute, the Comprehensive Center for Brain Health and strengthened the ALS Center. In addition, multiple Centers of Excellence were achieved, and the hospitals obtained stroke center of excellence designations.

In January 2023, Dr. Sacco lost his battle with brain cancer. His leadership helped establish the Department as a hub for neurological clinical care, research and education, and his work was integral to advancements in overall brain health, stroke and cardiovascular disease prevention and treatment, and helped advance health equity.

While he will never be forgotten, under chair, Jose J. Romano, M.D.  we continue to transform lives for those with neurological disorders.

Walter G. Bradley, D.M., F.R.C.P. – Chair

The 1990s, under Dr. Bradley, the full-time faculty of the department had expanded to 45, a third of whom were basic neuro-science researchers. All were involved in teaching to a greater or lesser extent. In addition, 50 voluntary faculty assisted the full-time faculty in teaching and indigent patient care.

The clinical services covered the whole range of neurological diseases. The department sees patients in the Professional Art Center Clinic, the National Parkinson’s Foundation Clinic, Veterans Administration clinic and the Jackson Memorial Hospital Clinic. the The Department had 40 beds for acute neurological problems in Jackson Memorial Hospital, 35 adult neuro-rehabilitation beds in the Ryder Trauma Center, and 5 – 10 acute and rehabilitation Pediatric Neurology beds. The Neurology Service at the Veterans Administration Hospital has 10 allocated beds. The areas of clinical specialization of the faculty include Stroke, Epilepsy, Movement Disorders, Neuromuscular Disease, Neuropsychology, Multiple Sclerosis, Behavioral Neurology and Dementia; Headaches, Pediatric Neurology, Neuro-Opthalmology, Neurorehabilitation including Brain and Spinal Cord Injury, Neurovirology and AIDS, Neuro-Oncology and Sleep Disorders.

Research extended over virtually the whole range of neurological diseases as well. The department was one of the largest in the country. Research grants totaled about $3 million per year in direct costs, and about $1.5 million per year in indirect costs. The faculty clinical practice earnings amounted to about $4 million per year, and the total annual budget of the Department was approximately $11 million. There were 21 residents and nearly a dozen fellows in the program.

A major research area of the department is Cerebral Vascular Disease, the long-term interest of Dr. Peritz Scheinberg. Another is Parkinson’s disease in collaboration with the National Parkinson Foundation. The Cerebral Vascular Disease Research Center, started by Dr. Peritz Scheinberg, is now in its 41st year of NIH funding, and it is the longest continuously-funded center in the USA. The long-standing clinical and research effort in Parkinson’s disease continues a long tradition of collaboration with the National Parkinson Foundation, which started and remains based in Miami.

Additional major research groups include those in neurotransmitters, including Alzheimer’s disease, Neurovirology, and Neurological Complications of AIDS, Spinal Cord Physiology, Neuronal Metabolism, Molecular Genetics, Neuromuscular Diseases, Physiology of Aging of the Nervous System, Epilepsy, and Trauma of the Nervous System. The underlying principle of all of these research groups? Basic research is of crucial importance to advance our understanding of clinical diseases, and from the collaboration of basic research workers and clinicians comes an improvement in the understanding and treatment of those human diseases. Each of these research groups is responsible for continuing advances in our understanding of the cause and cure of human neurological diseases, and for teaching clinicians and research workers from all over the world who return to their own cities and countries to continue this work.

Dr. Bradley retired in 2006. In April of 2007, Dr. Ralph Sacco became the third Chair in the department’s history. He was recruited from Columbia Presbyterian and is a world-renowned neurologist specializing in Stroke. In 2010, he became the first neurologist to become President of the American Heart Association.

Peritz Scheinberg, M.D. – Chair

In February 1955, the Division of Neurology in the Department of Psychiatry was created with Dr. Scheinberg as director of that program with the title of associate professor of Neurology. He was the director and only faculty member in the division, which had no established neurology service at Jackson Memorial Hospital. Prior to this, all neurology post-doctoral teaching and all neurology consults at Jackson Hospital had been handled by four neurosurgeons, who rotated the responsibility. The first step was to establish a presence for the new Division of Neurology by opening a Neurological Out-Patient Clinic at Jackson, and to begin to provide some teaching in neurology for the medical house staff at Jackson, as well as the medical students whose clinical years were spent at Jackson. The division also provided neurological consultations for private physicians.

The Department of Psychiatry underwent a series of leadership changes beginning in 1955 and continuing for the next three to four years. Thus, because both Dr. Reinmuth and Scheinberg were trained in and board-certified in Internal Medicine as well as Neurology, the neurology division sought and achieved a transfer to the Department of Medicine.

Neurology Becomes a Department

By 1961, it became evident that neurology needed its own representation on the Executive Committee of the Faculty in order to grow and prosper. After prolonged negotiations, in early 1962, neurology was granted department status and could compete for limited resources available on a more equitable basis.

By the end of 1962, the Department of Neurology had recruited an outstanding cadre of house officers and had a large and thriving staff and private inpatient services on 4 Woodard and Skaggs. It was providing consultative neurologic services for most of South Florida, the Caribbean area, and Central and South America. The cerebral blood flow laboratories competed successfully for research grants, and the laboratory began to attract fellows from other parts of the U.S., South America, Europe, and Japan.

The 1960s and 1970s – A Period of Expansion

The 1960s and 1970s saw the expansion of the clinical programs with the arrival of chiefs and heads for every major neurological specialty. The residency-training program was considered to be of high quality, and was competitive for high quality house officers with the upper echelon of training programs in the U.S. The program accepted six Adult Neurology Residents and one Pediatric Neurology Fellow each year, along with several clinical and research fellows, so that there were 26 to 28 trainees in the Department at any given time.

The Neurology Service at the V.A. Hospital, which moved from the old Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables to the new facility directly across 12th Avenue from Jackson Memorial Hospital, became an integral part of the Residency Training Program
in Neurology.

Following completion of the Rosenstiel Medical Sciences Building in 1969, the face of the campus began to change, and the department was able to move a considerable portion of its research laboratories to the new building. By this time, the University of Miami Cerebral Vascular Research Laboratories had achieved international recognition and scientists from Europe, Israel, South America, and Japan took training fellowships and sabbaticals in the laboratory.

In 1978, the department of neurology re-located most of the clinical, administrative, and research activities to the National Parkinson Foundation Building (NPF). This was the result of an agreement between the University and the NPF in agreement which was felicitous for both parties. The University gained much needed space and the NPF as afforded, for the first time, a true clinical and scientific presence.

Continuing Growth in the 1980s

The 1980s saw additional specialty expansion and growth in NIH funding. The addition of Neuro-Rehabilitation, Neuro-Oncology, and the Sleep Center increased the breadth of the department. Dr. Peritz Scheinberg was elected President of the American Neurological Association and the Association of University Professors of Neurology in 1981.

In 1995 the Peritz Scheinberg Chair in Neurology was endowed from gifts from faculty, former residents, patients, friends, and family.

Dr. Scheinberg retired as Chair in 1989 and, following an interim acting Chairship by Dr. Noble David, Dr. Walter Bradley formerly Chair of the Department of Neurology at the University of Vermont was appointed as Chair. Dr. Bradley received his neurological training in Great Britain (Oxford and Newcastle upon Tyne) and has had a distinguished career as a clinician and scientist, particularly in neuro-muscular disorders.

Neurology had a presence in the University of Miami even prior to the opening of the Medical School in 1952. When Dr. Peritz Scheinberg came to Miami from Duke in 1950, he was in part-time private practice and obtained an NIH grant to support studies in human cerebral blood flow and metabolism. His laboratories were in the old ballroom of the original Coral Gables Biltmore Hotel, which had been converted to a Veterans’ Administration Hospital. This was also the site of what was then known as the University of Miami Medical Research Unit, a group of medical investigators located in that same building. Dr. Scheinberg was appointed Assistant Professor of Physiology in that Unit, and his laboratory was active and productive for the next three years, publishing 16 major articles on cerebral circulatory and metabolic functions in various physiologic states and diseases in peer review journals. One of these was the first article to be published under the by-line of the new University of Miami School of Medicine which began its first classes in the fall of 1952. That research was conducted with the assistance of several local practicing physicians whose only motivation was scientific curiosity.