Speakers of European Brain Health Summit 2025

Claudio Bassetti has been full Professor of Neurology at the Inselspital in Bern since 2012 and Dean at the Medical Faculty in Bern since 2020. Bassetti received his medical degree in Basel, trained in neurology in Bern and Lausanne, and performed research fellowships in Basel, Michigan, Boston and Minneapolis. Bassetti’s interests include the care of patients with a broad range of neurological disorders, the research on the relationship between sleep and brain disorders (e.g. narcolepsy, stroke), and the education of new generations in general neurology and sleep medicine. Bassetti authored >600 publication (H-Index>105) and >10 books. He launched and currently still chairs the MAS on Sleep medicine and the CAS on Brain Health of the University of Bern. Bassetti served as president of the EAN (2019-2022), European Neurological Society, European Sleep Research Society, and Swiss Neurological Society. Since 2023 he is the Vice-President of the EBC. Bassetti launched in 2022 the EAN Brain Health, and in 2023 the Swiss Brain Health Plan.

Paul Boon is Past-President of the European Academy of Neurology, a senior full professor of neurology and Director of 4Brain at Ghent University, Belgium. Prof. Boon is Chair of the Division of Head, Movement and Senses, as well as professor of Neuromodulation, at Eindhoven University of Technology. He obtained his medical degree from Ghent University and received additional training at Yale University. He is a Fellow of the European Academy of Neurology (FEAN). Prof. Boon’s main neurological interests are clinical epilepsy, neurological sleep disorders, quantitative EEG and MEG analysis and basic mechanisms of neuromodulation. He founded the 4Brain Laboratory for Clinical and Experimental Neurophysiology, Neurobiology and Neuropsychology at Ghent University.

Agnese Cattaneo is the Chief Medical Officer at Angelini Pharma, a company with a strong strategic and scientific focus on Brain Health. After obtaining her degree in Medicine and specializing in Endocrinology, she pursued a PhD in Metabolic Sciences. With over 15 years of experience in the pharmaceutical industry, Agnese has held senior international roles within the Medical Departments of multinational companies, including Novartis and AstraZeneca, before joining Angelini Pharma nearly seven years ago.

Her career has been marked by a growing interest in medical and clinical research, spanning multiple therapeutic areas, including metabolic and rare diseases, with a special focus on Brain Health. Agnese is committed to advancing data generation and exploring innovative opportunities to integrate AI and machine learning tools, aiming to deepen the understanding of brain-related conditions, investigate predictive models, and drive research that is both sustainable and impactful for patients.

Andreas Demetriades graduated from the University of Cambridge and completed his basic and higher surgical training in London. He completed fellowships in skull base surgery in Tokyo, and in complex spine surgery in Munich as well as Oxford. He is a Consultant Neurosurgeon at the Royal Infirmary Edinburgh, Scotland, UK. His main research interests are outcome studies in clinical neurosurgery, including complex spinal surgery; neurotraumatology; Trigeminal neuralgia; and history of neuroscience. He has maintained an interest in the History of Medicine alongside his clinical work. He is currently the President of the Scottish Society of the History of Medicine, and the Royal Society of Medicine's History of Medicine Society. He has served in several committees and positions of responsibility within the European Association of Neurosurgical Societies (EANS), including Chair of the Young Neurosurgeon’s Committee, Chair of the Individual Membership Committee, Secretary of the Board, and serving as President in 2021-2023.

Tarun Dua is the Head of Brain Health Unit in the Department of Mental Health, Brain Health and Substance Use at World Health Organization Headquarters. The aim of the unit is to promote optimal brain development, cognitive health and wellbeing for all, and prevention and management of neurological disorders across the life-course. The unit is responsible for coordinating the implementation of the intersectoral action plan on epilepsy and other neurological disorders as well as global action plan on public health response to dementia.

Robin Lemmens is a stroke neurologist with specific certification in rehabilitation and the head of the stroke unit at the University Hospitals Leuven, Belgium. He graduated from the KU Leuven Medical School in 2003, obtained his PhD in 2009 and finished his residency in Neurology in 2010. His main research interests are imaging of acute stroke focusing on the role of MRI and CT for understanding stroke pathophysiology and guiding treatments. He closely collaborates with engineering sciences to study the involvement of artificial intelligence in stroke clinical practice. Since 2012 he is a clinical investigator of FWO Flanders, and he has received several national and international research grants. Additionally, he is national coordinator of clinical trials in acute stroke treatment and secondary stroke prevention. He is a fellow and previous member of Board of Directors of the European Stroke Organization, previous chair of the Conference Planning Group for ESOC 2023 and 2024, previous Chair of ESOTA (European Stroke Organisation Trials Alliance) and vice-chair of the Belgian Stroke Council. He serves on several committees and boards at the University Hospitals Leuven and KU Leuven.

Elena Moro is the current President of the European Academy of Neurology. She is Professor of Neurology at the Grenoble Alpes University, Grenoble, France. She graduated in medicine at the University of Trieste, Italy, and completed her residency in neurology at the Rome Catholic University, after which she completed a fellowship in movement disorders in Grenoble, France. She has been Associate Professor of Neurology at the University of Toronto from 2002 to 2012, when she moved back to Grenoble, She is currently director of the Movement Disorders Center and head of the Department of Psychiatry, Neurology, Neurological Rehabilitation and Forensic Medicine at the CHU of Grenoble. Her main research  is focused on restoring brain function in patients with movement disorders, especially with deep brain stimulation.

Konrad Rejdak graduated from the Medical University of Lublin (Poland). Prof. Konrad Rejdak trained clinical neurology in Lublin (Poland) and had clinical attachments in Erlangen (Germany) and London (UK). His main research and clinical interest include multiple sclerosis and other inflammatory diseases. Other interests include biomarker discovery and advanced technology devices development for neurological patients. He was trained and worked at the Department of Neuroinflammation, Institute of Neurology, UCL in London (UK). He performed several projects relating to the markers of inflammatory and neurodegenerative processes in the course of neurological diseases, publishing the results in international peer-reviewed journals. Currently, Prof. Konrad Rejdak is a consultant neurologists and head of the Department of Neurology, Medical University of Lublin (Poland). He is a member of the executive committee and past president of the Polish Neurological Society (2021-2024). He is a member of Programme Committee of European Academy of Neurology.

Tomás Ryan originally graduated from Trinity College Dublin in 2005 with a BA in genetics. He completed his PhD in molecular neuroscience under the supervision of Seth Grant at the University of Cambridge and the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in the UK in 2009. His thesis work was supported by a Wellcome Trust PhD Fellowship. Following a year as Junior Research Fellow at Wolfson College, University Cambridge, he relocated to the USA to work as a Postdoctoral Researcher in the group of Susumu Tonegawa (Nobel Laureate, 1987) at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). At MIT he was centrally involved in the development of novel genetic methods that allow for the labelling and manipulation of specific memory engrams in the rodent brain. This work was supported by Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) and RIKEN Brain Sciences Institute, Japan. He started his research group in 2017 at Trinity College Dublin, where he is an Associate Professor in the School of Biochemistry and Immunology and a Principal Investigator at the Trinity College Institute of Neuroscience. Tomás also holds a joint faculty position at the Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health at the University of Melbourne, Australia. His research team has been supported by the European Research Council (ERC), Science Foundation Ireland (SFI), the Irish Research Council (IRC), the Jacobs Foundation, the Brain & Behavior Research Foundation, the Lister Institute of Preventative Medicine, and the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research (CIFAR). He is Chair of the Federation of European Neuroscience Societies (FENS) Advocacy Committee, and a member of the US Society for Neuroscience (SfN) Government and Public Affairs Committee.

Jan Schadrack is an MD PhD and specialized in psychiatry and neuropharmacology. He joined Roche Global Medical Affairs in 2015 and serves as the Therapeutic Area Head Neuroscience and Rare Diseases. In the biopharmaceutical industry he held various Clinical Development and Medical Affairs roles and gained longstanding and profound experience in Neuroscience including rare neurological diseases. His two big passions are medicine and neuroscience, and he strongly believes that the possibilities of the biosciences and the digital age will rapidly transform the science and medical practice especially of nervous system disorders and numerous rare diseases.

Johan Van Overtveldt is a Member of the European Parliament (MEP), a journalist and politician affiliated with the New Flemish Alliance (N-VA). He notably served as the Minister of Finance of Belgium from 2014 to 2018. Since 2019, Mr. Van Overtveldt has chaired the Committee on Budgets in the European Parliament and served on the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, playing a pivotal role as the Parliament's rapporteur on the Multiannual Financial Framework for 2021–2027.

Donna Walsh joined the International Bureau for Epilepsy [IBE] as Chief Executive Officer in January 2022. Since her appointment she has been responsible for overseeing the new strategic direction of IBE and, with a newly hired team, is working to ensure IBE empowers and amplifies the voices of people with epilepsy globally. Prior to her role with IBE, she worked as Executive Director of the European Federation of Neurological Associations (EFNA) for 10 years. Donna has been active in representing the neurology patient community throughout her career, including as a board member of the European Brain Council, a member of the European Affairs Sub-Committee at the European Academy of Neurology, and as a member of the World Health Organization’s NeuroCovid Global Forum. Donna has also moderated and chaired many events and has shared patient insights at high-level conferences and meetings at institutions such as the World Health Organisation and European Parliament.