The Culture of Different MKTG_150064494_2018 Service Line Big Book Full_FIN | Page 18

PA G E 1 6
The Culture of Different
N E U RO LO GY A N D N E U RO S U RG E RY
Marcy Yonker, MD,
Joins as New Headache
Program Director
Though headaches in children usually don’t indicate a serious medical
condition, chronic headache pain can cause life-altering problems for
kids and their families.
Marcy Yonker, MD, the newest leader to
join the Neuroscience Institute.
Not enough people acknowledge this, says Marcy Yonker, MD,
Director of the Headache Program at Children’s Hospital Colorado,
and it’s interfering with kids getting the comprehensive care they need.
“There’s a whole group of kids who have chronic headache problems,
and we need to give them good care,” Dr. Yonker says.
The reason that isn’t happening enough, according to Dr. Yonker, is that
there aren’t enough pediatric specialists in headache; filling vacant
positions is difficult, and waitlists to see a provider only grow longer.
That’s her first mission at Children’s Colorado: growing the program,
training more young clinicians, and tending to the patients with the
most severe headaches so they can end their pain soon.
To that end, Dr. Yonker hopes to make clinical trials more available
to kids with headaches. Currently, she’s collaborating with major
pharmaceutical companies to bring clinical trials to kids in Colorado,
including new treatments such as monoclonal antibodies that are
currently in clinical trials in adults.
“People at Children’s Colorado are really forward-thinking in
what is the right thing for the patient,” Dr. Yonker says. “There’s an
opportunity here to really focus on headache.”
Chief of Pediatric Neurology, Amy Brooks-Kayal, MD,
in the Neurology Outpatient Clinic.
The Culture of Different
17