Randolph B. Schiffer

The Guest Editor of this issue of Seminars in Neurology is Randolph Schiffer, M.D. Dr. Schiffer is the Medical Director of the Cleveland Clinic Lou Ruvo Center for Brain Health, in Cleveland and Las Vegas. He is a world-renowned physician-scientist.

Dr. Schiffer did his undergraduate work at Yale University and obtained his M.D. from the University of Michigan. He was a Resident in Psychiatry at Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester, New York and a Resident in Neurology at the University of Michigan. He began his academic career at the University of Rochester where, as an Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Neurology, he was the Founding Director of the General Neurology Unit, Department of Neurology, University of Rochester. He was Chair of a Task Force on Practitioner-Assisted Suicide and elected by the women at the University of Rochester to Co-Chair a Committee on the Status of Women. It would be terribly interesting to sit down with him and have him tell us more about this. The Texans then stole him away, and he became the Vernon and Elizabeth Haggerton Chair in Neurology, and Chair, Department of Neuropsychiatry and Behavioral Science, Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, Lubbock, Texas. He has had remarkable success in obtaining endowments for neurodegenerative diseases, addiction medicine, Alzheimer's disease, epilepsy, and healthy aging. He has received several awards for his work, my favorite of which is the establishment by the Garrison Institute on Aging of the “Randolph B. Schiffer Award” for the Advancement of Science in Aging.

Dr. Schiffer is an Editor of two textbooks, Neuropsychiatry and Synopsis of Neuropsychiatry. He is an author of The Medical Evaluation of Psychiatric Patients. He has contributed countless peer-reviewed articles, book chapters, reviews, and editorials. He is a master teacher and contributes a great deal to our education with his very popular and highly regarded Course at the American Academy of Neurology.

We are tremendously grateful to Dr. Schiffer and to all of the contributors to this issue of Seminars in Neurology for providing us with their expertise to enhance our care of patients. Neurological patients with psychiatric problems challenge us and frustrate us most often because we feel inadequately prepared to care for them. The knowledge provided by the manuscripts in this issue is a treasure for helping us to help our patients.