Dr. Raymond Romano is a clinical researcher and nurse practitioner in the Department of Neurology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Working primarily in the Vanderbilt Memory and Alzheimer’s Center (VMAC), his research interests involve the diagnosis and care for Alzheimer’s disease patients at the primary care level.

Dr. Romano’s work has been published in such journals as Journal of the American Association of Nurse Practitioners, Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, and Biological Research For Nursing. He is a member of a number of professional organizations including the American Association of Nurse Practitioners, American Nurses Association, Tennessee Nurses Association, and Gerontological Advanced Practice Nurses Association.

He earned his Ph.D. in Nursing Science from the University of Tennessee. Prior to his doctorate work, Dr. Romano earned his MSN from the Vanderbilt University School of Nursing and worked as a family nurse practitioner with VUMC. He also served as the Employee Wellness Clinic Quality Improvement Coordinator for Metro Nashville Public Schools. Before transitioning to his nurse practitioner career, Dr. Romano earned his Master’s degree in Public Health from Boston University, during which time he studied international public health and worked on a community health program in Kenya. He earned his B.S. in Biology from Marymount Manhattan College in New York City.

Dr. Shailee Shah is an Assistant Professor in the Neuroimmunology Division at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Due to her clinical and research expertise in the neuroimmunology of neuro-ophthalmology, she has a dual appointment to the Department of Ophthalmology. She is an autoimmune neurologist with expertise in the management of both inpatient and outpatient neuroimmunologic diseases, and participates in various research and educational initiatives.  Dr. Shah is also a faculty consultant within the Vanderbilt Undiagnosed Disease Program and consults on the diagnosis of rare neurological diseases. She is also clinically involved in improving and streamlining care for patients with antibody-mediated neurological diseases. 

Dr. Shah’s research interests include the characterization of paraneoplastic and autoimmune neurological diseases, particularly as they pertain to vision loss, and emerging and acute therapeutics in these disorders. She is one of the primary investigators on the first international, multi-center trial for NMDA-Receptor encephalitis. She is also interested in biomarkers and imaging characteristics of optic neuropathies due to multiple sclerosis and disorders such as MOGAD or NMOSD. She is an awardee and participant in the NeuroNEXT Fellowship Program. In addition to her appointments at VUMC, Dr. Shah is an external research collaborator for the Mayo Clinic.

She has authored several peer-reviewed articles in such publications as Neurology, Neurology Neuroimmunology and Neuroinflammation, Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery and Psychiatry and Multiple Sclerosis Journal, and she has written several book chapters and review articles on paraneoplastic and autoimmune neurological diseases. She has given lectures on autoimmune neurological diseases at several national conferences.

Prior to her appointment at VUMC, Dr. Shah completed specialized fellowship training in Autoimmune Neurology and subsequently Multiple Sclerosis/Neuroimmunology at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine. During her time at Mayo, she also completed a Master’s in Clinical and Translational Sciences. She completed her residency at Northwestern McGaw Medical Center. She earned her M.D. from the Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University.

Tanya Kehoe is a Physician Assistant in the Department of Neurology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, specializing in Outpatient Epilepsy.  She is an active member of the American Academy of Physician Assistants.

Prior to her current position, Tanya worked as an occupational therapist in rehab for 15 years and physician assistant in neurosurgery.  She earned her Master of Medical Science at Northwestern University (Chicago, IL) and Bachelor of Science in Occupational Therapy from University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Faculty Spotlight

Dr. Aaron McMurtray is an Associate Professor of Neurology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center with subspecialty training in Behavioral Neurology and Neuropsychiatry.  Dr. McMurtray has certification from the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, and is a fellow in both the American Neurological Association and the American Academy of Neurology.  Dr. McMurtray received his undergraduate degree from Claremont McKenna College, his Doctor of Medicine from Vanderbilt University Medical School, and a Doctor of Philosophy from the University of Hawaii at Manoa.  Dr. McMurtray completed neurology residency at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, followed by a fellowship in Behavioral Neurology and Neuropsychiatry at the University of California at Los Angeles and the West LA Veterans Affairs Medical Center.

Faculty Spotlight

Dr. Keerthana Akkineni is currently an Assistant Professor of Neurology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, and specialized in Hospital Neurology, Epilepsy, Intraoperative Neurological Monitoring and Tele-neurology. She is a board-certified neurologist and clinical neurophysiologist.

She completed her Neurology Residency at Houston Methodist Hospital, Houston, TX and went on to do a Clinical Neurophysiology Fellowship at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, MA,  which serves as a teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School.

She serves as the clinical director for the inpatient neurology consult service. In addition to her administrative and leadership roles, she founded the Quality Improvement and Patient Safety Committee for the Department of Neurology which is focused on improving the quality, safety, and value of healthcare delivery within the department.  She is also very engaged in resident education and was awarded “The Resident’s Teaching Award” by the Department of Neurology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center.

Dr Akkineni was drawn to Vanderbilt by the complex pathology and collaborative environment among the faculty and residents. Outside work, she enjoys spending time with her Maltese poodle (Axon), trying new food and traveling the world with her husband.

Manus J. Donahue, MBA, PhD is a Professor of Neurology within the Division of Cognitive and Behavioral Neurology and serves as Assistant Vice Chair for Research. Dr. Donahue trained at Duke University (BS: Physics; BA: Philosophy), The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine (PhD: Biophysics), and the University of Oxford (post-doc: Neurology). He joined the Johns Hopkins faculty in 2009 and in 2010 moved to Vanderbilt University Medical Center, where he is currently a Professor of Neurology. His work is focused on using new imaging and computational approaches to characterize tissue function in health and disease and he has led NIH-funded trials whereby these approaches have been applied in patients with atherosclerotic cerebrovascular disease, moyamoya disease and syndrome, sickle cell disease, neurodegeneration (Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s disease), and peripheral lymphatic disorders to evaluate emerging therapies. He is Chair of the Vanderbilt Human Subjects Protections Committee (HS2), editorial board member for the Journal of Cerebral Blood Flow and Metabolism, member of the FDA-initiated Brain panel to determine endpoints in clinical trials of sickle cell disease, and chief executive officer of Biosight, LLC which operates as a clinical research organization.

Dr. Ryan Merrell joined the Vanderbilt faculty as division director for Neuro-Oncology in 2021. He earned  is BS in chemistry from the University of Alabama in Huntsville. He completed his medical degree from the University of Alabama in 2005.  Dr. Merrell completed his residency in neurology from the Mayo Clinic in Rochester in 2009 followed by fellowship in neuro-oncology at the Massachusetts Cancer Center/Dana Farber Cancer Institute in 2010. He served at NorthShore University HealthSystem in Chicago for eleven years. During that time, he was director of Neuro-Oncology for nine years. While there, he ran numerous clinical trials for patients with brain tumors.