Renée Shellhaas, MD, MS, is a Professor of Neurology and Senior Associate Dean for Faculty Promotions & Career Development at Washington University in St Louis School of Medicine, where she also holds the David T. Blasingame professorship. She received her MD from the University of Michigan and completed her residency in Pediatric Neurology and fellowship in Clinical Neurophysiology at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Following her fellowship, Dr. Shellhaas returned to the University of Michigan, where she joined the faculty and completed a Master’s Degree in Clinical Research Design and Statistical Analysis and the UM School of Public Health. She transitioned to a senior leadership position at Washington University in the fall of 2022.

Dr. Shellhaas’ research focuses on neonatal seizures and brain monitoring, sleep in at-risk infants, and early life epilepsy. Her work has been funded by NIH, PCORI, and multiple foundations. She has served on numerous CNS committees – including as Councilor for the MidWest – and is the 2024 Hower Award recipient.

Dr. Shellhaas is currently a member of the American Epilepsy Society Board of Directors. She is also a member of the American Academy of Pediatrics Section on Neurology Executive Committee, and serves as President of the Pediatric Epilepsy Research Foundation®.

Dr. Elaine Wirrell is Professor of Neurology and Chair of Child Neurology at Mayo Clinic. She completed her MD degree at the University of British Columbia and her Neurology training at Dalhousie University. Her passion is to improve the lives of children with epilepsy, appreciating the tremendous impact this condition has on the entire family, and the critical importance of addressing seizures and comorbidities.

She was awarded the Mayo Clinic Distinguished Clinician award in 2016 and the Kiffin-Penry Award for Excellence in Epilepsy Care from the American Epilepsy Society in 2021. Dr. Wirrell is a founding member of the Pediatric Epilepsy Research Consortium, which was established to facilitate multicenter, collaborative research amongst US pediatric epileptologists with a focus on optimizing therapies and outcomes for young children with DEEs. She is Chair of the Medical Advisory Board of the Lennox-Gastaut Foundation and member of the Medical Advisory Board for the Dravet Syndrome Foundation.

Since 2019, Dr. Wirrell has served as Co-Editor-in-Chief for Epilepsy.com, the public education website for the Epilepsy Foundation of America, working to build pediatric content in key areas such as epilepsy syndromes, DEEs, genetic causes of epilepsy and comorbidities.

Through her work with the ILAE and the International Child Neurology Association, she has strived to improve epilepsy care world-wide. She is the past Co-Chair of the ILAE Nosology and Definitions Task Force, which proposed clinical criteria for defining epilepsy syndromes, and in her role as Chair of the Research Committee of ICNA, is developing resources to facilitate research in resource-limited regions.

She is a member of the ILAE Pediatrics Commission and current Co-Chair of the Medical Therapies Task Force. She is strongly committed to educating the next generation of child neurologists and pediatric epileptologists, serving as previous Program Director of Child Neurology at Mayo Clinic, and as prior Co-Chair of the Pellock Epilepsy Symposium for the past 6 years.