The UCSF Memory and Aging Center (MAC) maintains training programs for many levels and types of learners, ranging from a one-month clinical experience in behavioral neurology to two-year programs providing comprehensive clinical and research training. MAC training is open to students, fellows and experienced professionals from the US and other countries.
Our program aims to create a diverse workforce of leaders focused on preventing and treating brain disorders that cause cognitive and behavioral difficulties to minimize the impact of these disorders in people from all cultures and regions of the world. We stress that understanding the clinical presentations of brain disorders is a bedrock principle for all other aspects of research and care. Through our extensive clinical and research activities, we provide exposure to a diverse array of patients affected by these disorders and pair this with exposure to multiple approaches for advancing knowledge about diagnosis and care. Below is a listing of our current training programs. Training with specific investigators (e.g., postdoctoral research fellowships) may also be arranged by contacting that investigator directly.
Behavioral Neurology Training Program
The UCSF Behavioral Neurology Training Program (BNTP) is a two-year program designed to prepare physicians for a career that focuses on research and care for patients with cognitive and behavioral impairment due to neurological disease. The training is based on the principles of behavioral neurology, particularly brain-behavior relationships, and understanding the use of additional testing to fully characterize a patient’s problem, including many experimental approaches, from experimental cognitive testing to advanced imaging. The BNTP mostly trains neurologists but has trained physicians in other relevant fields such as psychiatry and geriatric medicine and welcomes applications from these disciplines. The program is certified by the United Council on Neurologic Specialties (UCNS). Fellow supervision and evaluation are provided by the Program Director Howard Rosen, MD and Co-Director Bruce Miller, MD (Director of the Memory and Aging Center), in addition to research advisors chosen by the trainee.
Training occurs primarily through the multidisciplinary MAC Clinic and research program dedicated to improving diagnosis and treatment of cognitive and behavioral disorders resulting from neurodegenerative disease. As part of the UCSF Department of Neurology, which has over 100 faculty members, the MAC maintains strong collaborative relationships with other clinical programs and with basic scientists ranging from molecular biologists to cognitive neuroscientists both at UCSF and other Bay Area institutions. Research conducted through the MAC uses many techniques including extensive clinical assessments, experimental paradigms gleaned from neuroscience and psychology, functional and structural neuroimaging, gene expression studies and proteomics. These techniques are applied to many clinical populations including patients with mild cognitive impairment, Alzheimer’s disease, frontotemporal dementia and parkinsonian dementias. This stimulating, diverse clinical and research environment gives trainees a broad exposure to current research relevant to behavioral neurology and access to a wide variety of research mentors. The program actively seeks ethnically and culturally diverse scholars from a variety of medical and scientific fields. See Diversity at the Memory and Aging Center.
The first year focuses on building expertise in three areas:
- Principles of brain-behavior correlation
- Clinical manifestations of brain disorders affecting cognition and behavior, in particular, neurodegenerative diseases
- Development of clinical skills for evaluation of cognitive and behavioral abnormalities, including interpretation of neuropsychological and behavioral data.
This clinical experience is critical for a research career in behavioral neurology, as clinical assessment is at the core of diagnosis for both clinical and research purposes, and clinical problems help set the goals for a research agenda and generate novel research hypotheses. Clinical experience at the MAC is supplemented with weekly didactic conferences and rotations through the major clinical research venues.
During the second year, clinical activities are reduced (about one to two days per week), with the rest of the time being devoted to research.
Through the Research Education Component (REC) of the UCSF Alzheimer’s Disease Center, our program also provides BNTP fellows with exposure to topics such as health economics, policy, and biomarker research while ensuring appropriate grounding in basic science. The REC supports leadership training and balanced multidisciplinary mentoring from both basic science and clinical research faculty.
Application Process
Applicants for the Behavioral Neurology Training Program must have completed a residency in neurology, psychiatry, or other relevant specialty and have a license to practice medicine in the United States.
Please send your completed Program Application to [email protected]. Program applications are due by April 30 of each year for applicants intending to start in July of the following year (applications due 14 months before intended start date), but earlier applications are accepted and encouraged. After review of the applications, qualified candidates will be invited to interview with members of the training program and learn more about the clinical and research environment at UCSF.
In recognition of the higher cost of living in San Francisco, a housing stipend is available for Behavioral Neurology Training Program fellows.
For more information, please call 415.476.5591 or email [email protected].
Atlantic Fellow for Equity in Brain Health Program at GBHI
The Global Brain Health Institute (GBHI) works to reduce the scale and impact of dementia by training and supporting a new generation of leaders who want to make a lasting impact on brain health in their communities and around the world. The collaboration is co-directed by internationally recognized experts at the University of California, San Francisco and Trinity College Dublin, the University of Dublin. GBHI’s work emphasizes the health of vulnerable populations. The program values and supports innovative, interprofessional research and promotes activities to enhance international collaborations.
The Atlantic Fellows for Equity in Brain Health program at GBHI provides innovative training in brain health, leadership and dementia prevention to a broad array of promising leaders. The program is designed to train individuals from any profession – including but not limited to medicine, science, public policy, journalism, business, law and the arts – provided they possess the skill, compassion and drive to be a force of change for brain health. Through their work, fellows are expected to emphasize local and global health inequities that need to be addressed by practitioners and policymakers, with the goal of transforming local communities around the world.
Atlantic Fellows join the program for 12 months and have a base at the UC San Francisco or Trinity College Dublin. A core curriculum of weekly courses in economics, epidemiology, law and ethics, leadership, neuroscience, public policy and statistics constitutes part of the experience. Fellows also engage in projects aimed at advancing brain health and have opportunities to work with individuals with cognitive disorders. Through intensive mentoring, fellows are guided in the development of their projects, careers, leadership, policy change and impact on brain health.
After their training, fellows return to their home communities to implement their projects and newly acquired knowledge. They continue to have access to career-duration mentoring, pilot funds and an international network of colleagues collaborating to drive a common mission. Fellows should be passionate advocates for older individuals – healthy and impaired, demonstrate the ability to ask questions that cut across disciplines, adapt to different cultural contexts and lead change throughout their careers. Successful applicants are expected to demonstrate excellence in past activities, the drive to learn about aging and diseases of aging, and have strong regional support that assures smooth transition back into local programs.
Find more information at www.gbhi.org/programs.
Research Education Component of the UCSF Alzheimer’s Disease Center
The Research Education Component (REC) is a professional development program designed to foster rising leaders in Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRD) research. In the program, multidisciplinary mentorship teams support:
- Early scholars who have finished their training and are transitioning to their first faculty position and
- Advanced scholars who may already have grant support and a faculty position and are transitioning into independent investigators.
The year-long program combines core didactic content with active skill development, including leadership training, to provide components that are not provided by other programs. Lecture topics include health economics, global health, social determinants of health, health policy, biomarker research and models of neurodegeneration.
Each participant will have both a basic science and clinical research mentor to encourage creative, expansive approaches. Faculty directors of the program include Aimee Kao, MD, PhD; Howard Rosen, MD; and Kristine Yaffe, MD. These leaders have years of experience as mentors combined with deep experience across disciplines and research methods. Furthermore, the program has extensive collaborations with other UCSF programs related to aging and diversity including the UCSF Claude D. Pepper Older American Independence Centers (OAIC) program, Resource Centers for Minority Aging Research (RCMAR), Mental Illness Research Education and Clinical Center (MIRECC), and the Global Brain Health Institute (GBHI) as well as other Alzheimer’s Disease Centers around the country.
The program actively seeks ethnically and culturally diverse scholars from a variety of medical and scientific fields (see Diversity at the Memory and Aging Center). Third- and fourth-year neurology and psychiatry residents are welcome to apply for a specialized year-long experience in behavioral neurology.
Apply to the REC
Interested candidates should submit a formal application, including:
- A personal statement describing their research background and interests,
- Their CV,
- A description of their proposed research in the form of a specific aims page,
- A list of their proposed mentor(s) and
- Two letters of recommendation.
The REC Executive Committee will review applications in early March, invite candidates for interviews in March and April, and make final decisions by May 1 for a start date of July 1 of each year.
For more information, please email [email protected].
Neuropsychology Training Program
The UCSF Neuropsychology Training Program in the Department of Neurology provides pre-doctoral and postdoctoral training in neuropsychology. Training occurs through the UCSF Memory and Aging Center (MAC), a multidisciplinary group dedicated to improving the diagnosis and treatment of cognitive and behavioral disorders resulting from neurological disease, in particular, neurodegenerative disorders. In addition to a large clinical service, we have research programs that focus on healthy aging, mild cognitive impairment, frontotemporal lobar disorders and Alzheimer’s disease. As part of the UCSF Department of Neurology, which has over 100 faculty members, the MAC maintains strong collaborative relationships with other clinical programs and with basic scientists in areas ranging from molecular biology to cognitive neuroscience at UCSF and other Bay Area institutions. The Neuropsychology Training Program shares resources with the Behavioral Neurology Training Program, a certified program designed to prepare physicians for research careers in behavioral neurology.
The University of California, San Francisco Memory and Aging Center (MAC) offers a two-year Neuropsychology Postdoctoral Fellowship. We are looking for candidates invested in a scientist-practitioner model and have the flexibility to design the fellowship around the individual fellow’s training needs and goals. Postdoctoral fellows typically spend approximately 50–70% of their time engaged in research activities, 20–30% in clinical activities and the rest of their time in training, supervision, supervising predoctoral trainees and a wide variety of didactic opportunities. The fellowship training program meets Houston Conference Guidelines. Primary research and clinical mentorship will be provided by Kaitlin Casaletto, PhD; Joel H. Kramer, PsyD, ABBP-CN; or Katherine Possin, PhD. Additional mentoring from other neuropsychology and neurology faculty is available and encouraged. The fellowship is a full-time, two-year commitment.
The ideal candidate: a) has clinical and research experience and has begun to develop his/her research training, b) is interested in specializing in cognitive aging and neurodegenerative diseases, c) is committed to clinical excellence and d) is eager to develop an independent scientist-practitioner academic career.
Applications: All applicants need to submit a cover letter, CV and three letters of recommendation to Nina Djukic. Learn about currently open postdoctoral positions.
University of California, San Francisco Memory and Aging Center (MAC) offers a one-year pre-doctoral practicum placement in clinical neuropsychology. The practicum involves 24 hours per week of clinical training, although additional hours are available if participation in research is desired.
The MAC is dedicated to providing the highest quality of care for individuals with cognitive problems, to conduct research on causes and cures for degenerative brain diseases, and to educate health professionals, patients and their families. Multidisciplinary research and clinical opportunities will range from healthy cognitive aging to typical (e.g., Alzheimer’s disease) and atypical (e.g., frontotemporal dementia, primary progressive aphasias, corticobasal syndrome, prion disease) neurodegenerative syndromes. Multimodal clinical and experimental brain measurement at the MAC includes, standard neuropsychological and neurological evaluations, structural and functional MRI, amyloid and tau PET, and biofluid proteomics (e.g., inflammatory markers). Predoctoral neuropsychological practicum trainees gain experiences in carrying out in-depth neuropsychological evaluations with a broad range of patients.
The ideal candidate: a) is in their 3+ year of clinical training, b) is interested in clinical neuropsychology, c) is enrolled or has completed coursework in neuropsychology, d) is committed to clinical excellence and e) is eager to learn about neurodegenerative diseases.
Applications: All applicants need to submit a cover letter, CV (please include GRE scores) and three letters of recommendation to Joel Kramer, PsyD, and Melanie Stephens, PhD. Please submit application material to [email protected].
More information: For more information, please email Melanie Stephens at [email protected].
Neurobehavioral Rotation Program
The UCSF Memory and Aging Center offers one-month rotations for senior medical students, residents and fellows that include an intense clinical experience, exposure to clinical research programs and formal didactic lectures. Rotator supervision and evaluation are provided by David Perry, MD, and Howard Rosen, MD.
While the rotation is required for UCSF neurology and psychiatry residents, it is open to other UCSF residents and fellows. UCSF medical students are welcome to apply for the elective in their senior year through Cha Viloria in the Curricular Affairs office ([email protected] or 415.476.8084).
Non-UCSF neurology residents may also apply for an elective rotation provided they have a US or Canadian medical license, malpractice insurance and health insurance. This is a 30-day monthly rotation beginning on the first day of the month. Please review the learning objectives for the one-month elective at the Memory and Aging Center and then complete the Program Application.
Non-UCSF medical students can also apply to do an elective rotation. Please visit the following link to read up on the program. For more information, please contact Education Division Specialist Jennifer Cantero at [email protected].
International Visiting Scholars
At the Memory and Aging Center (MAC), we welcome the opportunity to train physicians, psychologists and other medical professionals from around the world. The MAC International Visiting Scholar Program offers opportunities to collaborate in ongoing research projects.
International visiting scholars are physicians, psychologists or other medical professionals who wish to observe in our clinic or potentially collaborate in ongoing research projects at the MAC. Visiting scholars are often from abroad and funded by their home institutions during their time at the MAC. Visiting scholars are not required to have a US medical license and are not permitted to evaluate patients on their own. Please note that observation in the clinic is limited to one to two days per week per scholar, but there are clinical research visits to observe on other days.
Requirements
There are two types of visiting scholars: 1) Clinical Observers and 2) Research Scholars. Clinical Observers may participate for up to three months, with a minimum of one month. Please note medical students are not eligible for clinical observation. For Research Scholars, a minimum six-month stay is required. All applicants will have to show proof of English proficiency, preferably through recent TOEFL scores.
Visas and Administrative Fees
For Clinical Observation visits lasting up to three months, a B visa is required, Clinical Observation visits are submitted to the Department of Neurology Education Division, and there is a $500 processing fee. For visits longer than three months, a J1 visa is required and will be sponsored through UC San Francisco. The cost for a short-term J1 visa (less than one year) is $610 and a J1 (more than one year) visa is $640. The J1 visa fee increases with each additional year. Upon arrival, scholars reimburse the UC Regents for any visa costs and the Neurology Education Division processing fee of $500. Additionally, there is an administrative fee for visiting scholars of $300/month with a one-time $35 ID badge charge. The source of funding/payment for the visit must be identified before acceptance to the program. Visiting scholars are responsible for their own accommodations. Candidates who demonstrate a strong interest or record of leadership in dementia research or clinical work may apply for limited financial assistance.
Application Process
The first step is to complete the Program Application. Please submit completed applications via email to [email protected]. The application deadline is five to six months before the applicant’s preferred start date. We ask that applicants begin their visit on the first of the month. Once the application has been reviewed, we will contact you.
In addition to the program application, prospective Research Scholars are required to submit a five-page research proposal that outlines their research question and hypotheses, summarizes relevant literature and the significance of the proposed research, and includes methods and specific planned analyses.
For further inquiries, please contact [email protected].
US Visiting Students
The Memory and Aging Center Visiting Student Program offers training and observation of research studies under the supervision of a principal investigator. In addition, visiting students attend lectures and didactics. Visiting students are undergraduates or graduates enrolled in a degree-granting program at a university in the United States. Visiting students can stay for up to a year.
If you are interested in the US Visiting Student Program, please fill out the program application and send the completed application with the required documents in one PDF document to [email protected].
Grand Rounds
As part of its commitment to ongoing educational and professional development, the UCSF Memory and Aging Center hosts weekly seminars intended for academics in the Department of Neurology. These Friday seminars feature guest speakers from around the world and our own neurologists, neuropsychologists and cognitive neuroscientists discussing current and upcoming research including topics such as brain and behavior, neuropathology, dementia and cognition.
Diversity at the Memory and Aging Center
Our program considers the importance of diversity in considering both the people affected by brain disorders that cause cognitive and behavioral impairment and the workforce that tries to serve them. The MAC has many activities aimed at expanding the scope and impact of our work to include people from many regions, cultures and disciplines. These activities occur in parallel with efforts at UCSF Department of Neurology and UCSF in general to promote diversity.
Serving Diverse Populations
We recognize the importance of ensuring that all people benefit from the advancing knowledge about threats to brain health and how to mitigate them. Thus, at the MAC, we have created programs that attempt to bridge the gap between new developments in the academic setting and underserved communities. For many years, our program has been a leader in the assessment of cognitive and behavioral complaints in the Chinese American community, and more recently, we have expanded our efforts to reach the Latino community. Both of these programs are enabled by partnerships with Bay Area community centers and community health providers, and we continue to expand these efforts through continued outreach and by seeking additional funding. Recently, we have initiated projects to reach the Bay Area homeless population, which reflects increased attention at UCSF and in California on the problem of homelessness and the attendant threats to health.
Our center has growing collaborations with Bay Area and other community health care providers that serve a diverse group of clients, the goal of these collaborations being to extend cutting-edge assessment and care of cognitive and behavioral disorders to as many people as possible. Some of these community collaborators include the Neurology program at Kaiser Permanente, the Geriatrics clinic at the Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital, the Chinatown Public Health Center, Chinese Hospital, the Curry Senior Center, and the Mission Neighborhood Health Center. These collaborations extend to other centers in California, including Fresno and the Greater Los Angeles region, and to collaborators in other states, including Nebraska, New York and Illinois. These collaborations involve training, clinical assessment and research. Through large multicenter research projects, we also have collaborations with many academic programs in the US and many other countries.
Since 2015, our program’s ability to reach a larger and more diverse group of people facing challenges to brain health has been enhanced through the Atlantic Fellows for Equity in Brain Health Program at the Global Brain Health Institute (GBHI). Through GBHI, we train professionals from a variety of disciplines in principles of brain health. Because these trainees come from many parts of the world and many disciplines, they bring important, varied perspectives on brain health that influence the viewpoints of the faculty and trainees at our center. In addition, because they bring additional knowledge and skills about a variety of languages and cultures, Atlantic Fellows enhance our ability to reach people living in the US who come from diverse backgrounds. This robust addition to our program is greatly enhancing the relevance of our work for many individuals in the US and around the world.
Training a Diverse Group of Professionals
Our ability to serve the community is greatly enhanced by the inclusion of knowledge and perspectives from a variety of cultures, backgrounds and disciplines. UCSF, the UCSF Neurology Department and the MAC are committed to the inclusion of professionals that represent this wide variety of perspectives in our training programs.
UCSF maintains the Office of Diversity and Outreach, which is committed to “building a broadly diverse community, nurturing a culture that is welcoming and supportive and engaging diverse ideas for the provision of culturally competent education, discovery and patient care.” This office collaborates with all the professional schools and clinical programs at UCSF to promote inclusion across the school and medical center. Among the functions of this office are providing training, tracking progress toward maximum inclusion, and sponsoring and highlighting events and projects that enhance inclusion at our center in the community. Renee Navarro, MD, PharmD, the Vice-Chancellor for Diversity, has a strong commitment to communication with training programs about their efforts for inclusion, and she serves on the advisory committee for the UCSF MAC’s Behavioral Neurology Training Program.
The UCSF Department of Neurology continually strives to broaden inclusion in our department through multiple efforts. The department has appointed a Vice-Chair for Diversity, Nerissa Ko, MD, MAS, and formed the Neurology Diversity committee in 2014. This committee is currently co-chaired by Winston Chiong, a faculty member at the MAC and GBHI. In addition to coordinating with campus-wide efforts at inclusion, the Diversity Committee consults with Neurology training programs and highlights funding opportunities and campus and community events that facilitate outreach and inclusion. The MAC has taken advantage of funding from NIH and other sources to enhance diversity and will continue to do so.
The MAC works closely with the UCSF Office of Diversity and Outreach and the Neurology Diversity committee to ensure that our programs enhance inclusion, and we encourage all faculty and other team members to participate in diversity training and diversity-related events. In addition, the MAC’s leadership role in GBHI has greatly enhanced awareness and brought new opportunities regarding inclusion. In considering diversity, the MAC recognizes that factors such as race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, regional origins, physical abilities, and family income are among the factors that need to be considered in thinking, but in addition, professional diversity is also important. The categories of professions that can contribute to addressing brain health include physicians, nurses, psychologists, social workers, therapists and genetic counselors, but also go beyond these traditional health care professions. This is why the MAC established a visiting artist program several years ago, and in designing GBHI in collaboration with colleagues from Trinity College Dublin, we included anthropologists, economists, and artists among the types of learners we would include. This has greatly enriched the environment at our center and will help to ensure that the next generation of leaders dedicated to maintaining brain health throughout the world bring a wide variety of skills and perspectives. It also helps to make the MAC training an exciting and thought-provoking experience.
