Laurie M. Douglass, MD

Biography

Biography:

Dr. Douglass is the section chief of child neurology at Boston Medical Center, Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine. Dr. Douglass received a BS in Physical Therapy from Boston University and worked as a therapist while earning her MD degree from Tufts University School of Medicine. Subsequently, she trained in pediatrics at Boston Medical Center, followed by training both in child neurology and pediatric epilepsy at Tufts Medical Center. She has a long interest in improving care for children with epilepsy. Dr. Douglass helped to build two epilepsy centers for children; the first at Tufts Medical Center and subsequently at Boston Medical Center, where she currently serves as the Chief of the Division of Child Neurology and Director of Pediatric Epilepsy.

She trained in biostatistics, epidemiology, and clinical trials and was a fellow in the two year Clinical Research Training Program (supported by a NIH K30 award) at Boston University School of Medicine. Her research career has focused on epilepsy in the developing brain and improving health care systems for children with epilepsy. Dr. Douglass led the investigation of seizures in the NIH funded ELGAN-2, the Extremely Low Gestational Age Newborn study. Her work in ELGAN-2 required the development and validation of a novel parent seizure survey and careful coordination with the 13 other ELGAN sites. She continued to study seizures in this cohort, and is now the co-principal investigator of the NIH funded Environment, Epigenetics, Neurodevelopment & Health of Extremely Preterm. In 2016, she received funding from the Maternal Child Health Bureau at The Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) to improve access to quality health care for children and youth with epilepsy facing health disparities or geographic barriers using telehealth and mobile health applications. As principal-investigator on this project, she founded a research and innovation team, The Telehealth Epilepsy Care Collaborative (TECC). TECC has developed, implemented, and studied new tools to improve care for children and youth with epilepsy such as an on- line seizure screener being used by primary care physicians in high risk children, the Virtual Patient Centered Medical Home, and new approaches to supporting transition-age youth. In addition, Dr. Douglass was a pioneer in the use of telehealth into the home, one of the first to use this technology in 2016. She was refunded by HRSA (2019-2023) to continue this work and expand upon the novel approaches to care her team developed. In 2017, she secured funding from the Pediatric Research Foundation to validate the novel seizure screener in Spanish, implement it in the community, and disseminate the tool. In 2022, she was moved by the climbing rates of mental health symptoms in youth and felt compelled to study new approaches to this health crisis. She was awarded a grant by the Charles Hood Foundation to implement a novel intervention to address the mental health of high risk youth with epilepsy that will lay the foundation for additional work to address the mental health crisis of youth in the United States.

Highlights:
• Pediatric Epilepsy/Seizures
• Dietary therapies including the Ketogenic Diet for epilepsy
• Seizures and the developing brain
• Improving health care delivery for youth with epilepsy
• Transitioning care for young adults with seizures
• Mental Health in Youth with Epilepsy
• Medical Education for Child Neurology Residents