Jackson Memorial Hospital, the Miami Veterans Affairs Medical Center and the UHealth Tower, all located at the University of Miami Medical Campus, provide over 2500 hospital beds, making UM/Jackson the largest hospital facility in the southern United States. Jackson is the main referral hospital for communities in South Florida and in Central and South America and is one of the nation’s busiest hospitals.
Jackson Memorial Hospital (JMH) offers a broad range of tertiary services and clinical programs designed to care for the entire, largely underserved and disenfranchised, community, The JMH medical staff is recognized nationally for the quality of its patient care, teaching, and research. The depth and breadth of cases and the diverse pathologies make Jackson an ideal place to train in Neurology, offering residents the opportunities to see both bread and butter neurology plus all the “zebras.” The UHealth Tower (UHT located directly across the street from JMH), allows our trainees to see a wide variety of cases in a private, community-based hospital setting. UHT is affiliated with the NCI designated Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center providing neuro-oncology exposure as well as Bascom Palmer Eye Institute (perennially the #1 eye hospital in the US). The VA provides a third unique patient population and encompasses a combined inpatient and outpatient experience for residents. The combination of JMH, the Miami VA, and UHT provides a unique and comprehensive training environment that is second to none.
More than 100 faculty members comprise the UM Miller School of Medicine’s Department of Neurology and serve as faculty physician-educators in our Neurology residency training program, providing cutting-edge knowledge and experience in clinical neurology and neuroscience research. Every subspecialty area of neurology is well represented, and active recruitment is perpetual to broaden and strengthen the department. In July 2024, Dr. Jose Romano was named Chair of the Department of Neurology and is our 4th chairman since inception, with a vision for further growth and development, and with a strong focus on trainee education. Our prior department chair, Ralph L. Sacco, M.D., M.S., Professor and Chairman of Neurology and Olemberg Family Chair of Neurological Disorders, was past President of the American Academy of Neurology (AAN) and of the American Heart Association (AHA), and he was Editor-in-Chief of Stroke. He was preceded by Dr. Walter Bradley (1989 – 2006) and Dr. Peritz Scheinberg (1955- 1989). Our hospital system is recognized as a Comprehensive Stroke Center, a Level IV Comprehensive Epilepsy Center, and we carry several Center of Excellence designations including Parkinson’s disease and Multiple Sclerosis.
Residents will gain exposure and experience in patient care, education, and research across the neurology spectrum. Cerebrovascular disease, neuromuscular disorders, epilepsy, headache, neuro-oncology, neuro ICU, cognitive behavioral neurology, movement disorders, and neuroimmunology are embedded into the residents’ curriculum and clinical rotations. At UM/Jackson Health Systems, Fellowship opportunities are available across this subspecialty spectrum as well. Though housed outside of neurology, sleep medicine, spinal cord injury, and neuro-ophthalmology opportunities are readily available. Our trainees work hard and graduate well prepared to take care of patients in any neurological clinical scenario (just ask a graduate)!
There are also well-funded basic research programs in cerebrovascular disease, cerebral metabolism, neurotrauma, cell biology and molecular genetics, mitochondrial biology, neurovirology, neuroimmunology, and several other research fields. The Department is a national leader in funding for neurology research from the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Our state-of-the-art research programs include investigations into the pathological mechanisms of memory, ALS, stroke, cerebral vascular disease and myasthenia gravis. Our chair, Dr. Jose Romano, MD FAAN—Florida’s principal investigator of the NIH StrokeNet program and principal investigator for the Florida Stroke Registry—places a strong emphasis on research and scientific discovery. We have education and research grants potentially available to qualified trainees (T32, R25). We are also part of the NeuroNext network, an NIH/NINDS research collaborative consortium that funds and facilitates phase 2 clinical trials. We encourage all our residents to participate in research and for those with a strong interest in a career as a clinician-researcher we invite them to apply to the Resident Clinician Research Program.
Program Director
Associate Program Directors
Program Coordinator
Terry Crugnale
Email: tcrugnale@med.miami.edu