University of Kansas Medical Center
Kansas City, KS
Jeffrey Burns, MD, MS
Site PI
Jeffrey M. Burns, MD, MS, holds the Edward H. Hashinger Professorship of Medicine and serves as the Co-Director of the University of Kansas Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center (KU ADRC). This center is one of 33 nationally designated centers in the United States dedicated to Alzheimer’s research. Additionally, Dr. Burns leads the Department of Neurology's Neurocognitive Division, the Clinical and Translational Science Unit at Fairway, and the Clinical Core of the KU ADRC, which participates in national clinical trial networks. Dr. Burns established the Alzheimer’s clinical research program at the University of Kansas Medical Center in 2004. He is an alumnus of the University of Notre Dame, where he earned a BA in English and Japanese. His medical training was completed at the University of Kansas Medical Center, followed by a neurology residency at the University of Virginia and a post-doctoral fellowship focusing on Alzheimer's at Washington University in St. Louis. Returning to Kansas City, his hometown, he initiated the Alzheimer's clinical program to foster local research on Alzheimer’s disease and aging while exploring how lifestyle factors impact brain aging and Alzheimer's progression. The program has evolved into a hub for research and training, specializing in brain aging and Alzheimer’s disease. Since 2005, Dr. Burns has consistently secured NIH funding as a principal investigator, studying the effects of lifestyle on brain aging and the progression of Alzheimer’s disease.
Ryan Townley, MD
Site Co-PI
Ryan Townley, M.D., is an assistant professor in the Department of Neurology at the University of Kansas Medical Center and is the director of the Cognitive and Behavioral Neurology Fellowship. He is also the Alzheimer's Clinical Trials Consortium Associate Director and Primary Investigator at the University of Kansas Alzheimer's Disease Center. Dr. Townley is certified by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology and is UCNS certified in Behavioral Neurology and Neuropsychiatry. Before joining the KU Medical Center faculty in August 2019, he completed a two-year cognitive-behavioral fellowship at the Mayo Clinic School of Graduate Medical Education, where he also finished his neurology residency and an internal medicine internship. He graduated from the University of Kansas School of Medicine, where he earned the 2013 Dewey K. Ziegler Award for Excellence in Neurology presented by the KU Department of Neurology and was honored with the American Academy of Neurology's Outstanding Neurology Medical Student Award. Prior to medical school, he earned a bachelor of science in neurobiology from the University of Kansas.
Heidi Anderson
Site Liaison