DRAFT Directors and Teams
Team
Bob Wold
Executive Director
Bob's Bio
Bob is 65 years old and together with his wife Mary, of 46 years. have raised 4 children and are currently the proud grandparents of 9. He was diagnosed with Cluster Headaches approximately 40 years ago which eventually lead to his founding Clusterbusters, Inc. in 2002.
While raising his family, Bob spent 25 years as a youth sports coach for both boys and girls and spent several years as the President of one of the largest and most successful youth baseball leagues in the state of Illinois. Bob and his family also owned and operated a sports memorabilia store for many years in his home town of Lombard, Illinois.
Bob worked as a mechanical engineer and his accomplishments in that field include designs used in ICBM guidance systems, early versions of ATM machine mechanisms and the first soft serve ice cream machine for McDonald’s.
Many of his designs are still in use today. Bob eventually moved on to a family run construction business and continues today working full time in the construction industry.
In addition to his work as founder and President with Clusterbusters Inc., Bob sits on the Executive Board of AHDA (the Alliance for Headache Disorder Advocacy) and was one of the founding board members of AHMA (the American Headache and Migraine Association). Additionally, Bob is proud to serve many other positions within headache disorder advocacy groups including the National Headache Foundation’s Patient Advisory Council, the Eli Lilly Patient Advisory Board and the governance committee of CHAMP.
Bob’s work and accomplishments within the headache community include legislative initiatives and organizing events for the patient community and medical professionals in Washington DC. Among these successful issues have been the adoption of legislation, increased research funding, testifying before the FDA for additional treatment options and the formation of a training manual for SAMHSA.
Since the founding of Clusterbusters, the organization has grown to the largest cluster headache support and advocacy non-profit organization in the U.S. Bob’s work with Clusterbusters has included research projects carried out at institutions such as Harvard, Yale and the University of West Georgia in the United States, McGill University in Montreal Canada and Hannover Medical School in Hannover Germany.
Clusterbusters brings awareness and understanding of cluster headaches through such projects such as two National Geographic documentaries, magazine articles as well as TV, radio, newsprint and web based news outlets. Their education initiatives include regional patient meetings and highlighted by their annual patient conference. The 2019 conference will be their 14th and it’s annual growth continues to make it the largest gathering of cluster headache patients, caregivers and professionals in the world.
Michelle Crifasi
Executive Assistant
Michelle's Bio
Michelle’s days are also filled with her two teens, an orange rescue tabby, and managing her own health care. She enjoys consuming and creating art in many forms, and is a graduate of the Maryland Institute, College of Art. Her truest joy is helping people.
Kevin Lenaburg
Policy Director
Kevin's Bio
Kevin Lenaburg is the Policy Director for Clusterbusters, Inc., a national/international nonprofit organization that educates and advocates around cluster headache. Kevin brings twenty years of public health and advocacy experience to his work with Clusterbusters. For five years he led a national headache and migraine coalition, and prior to this he was Vice President at the world’s largest public relations agency, where he focused on healthcare communications and advocacy. Kevin’s experiences include building national coalitions, organizing stakeholder summits, engaging in policy and regulatory issues, and supporting relationships with a diverse range of organizations.
Kevin earned a master’s degree in Applied Politics from American University and a bachelor’s degree in Political Science from the University of California San Diego.
Board of Directors
Eileen Brewer
President
Eileen's Bio
Eileen is an event coordinator and advocates for those living with headache diseases. It was her event experience that brought her to Clusterbusters as the conference coordinator, but she later joined the board. She is passionate about serving this inspirational community. In addition to Clusterbusters, Eileen is the Board Secretary for the Alliance for Headache Disorders Advocacy, sits on the National Headache Foundation’s Patient Leadership Council, contracts with Chronic Migraine Awareness, volunteers with NDPH Aware, and is a moderator for Move Against Migraine.
As a wife and mother of two, Mrs. Brewer balances her life in the headache community with various personal commitments, including sitting as the Vice President of the local PTA, leading a Girl Scout troop, and managing several real estate investment properties. Eileen has devoted herself over the years to many volunteer opportunities including local and national political initiatives, and event planning and advocacy for local charities.
Ainslie Course
Vice President
Ainslie's Bio
Ainslie Course joined the Board of Directors at Clusterbusters, Inc in January 2020. Her involvement in the organization began some 20 years ago when she had exhausted all pharmaceutical options on medication and treatments. She has known Bob Wold since Clusterbusters was in its infancy and attended her first conference in Chicago in 2015. Her duties as a board member include raising the profile of Clusterbusters in the UK and Europe. The main aim is to eventually be able to have Clusterbusters host a UK/European conference.
Mrs. Course also manages the social media pages for Clusterbusters on Facebook and Twitter, posting updates on studies, research programs, and responding to direct messages, emails, and inquiries. She has experienced episodic cluster headaches for nearly 35 years and comes from a medical background. She was a specialist nurse in the area of oral and maxillofacial surgery for many years and now runs a small online business. Mrs. Course is honored to be a board member and a part of an amazing team of individuals who are dedicated to improving the lives of cluster headache patients and their caregivers.
Mark Massullo
Secretary
Mark's Bio
Mark has had episodic cluster headaches since 1986, when he experienced his first attack at age 25. Over the next 30 years, he received limited relief by way of traditionally prescribed medications. Increasingly discouraged over ineffective treatments and their damaging side effects, a determined internet search led him to Clusterbusters in 2016. Since then, he has discontinued use of prescription medications while advocating for raising awareness of the condition, increased funding for research, and alternative treatment options. A licensed mental health professional since 1995, Mark maintains a private practice in Chicago, offering psychoanalysis and psychotherapy to individuals and groups.
Andrew Cleminshaw
Treasurer
Andrew's Bio
Andrew Cleminshaw is the current Treasurer of Clusterbusters, Inc. He has experienced chronic cluster headaches for 17 years, beginning at the age of 12. After several years of searching for answers and an effective treatment, Andrew found Clusterbusters who gave him a new outlook on life and access to information about cluster headaches he didn’t have from his treating neurologist.
Mr. Cleminshaw has more than five years of experience in banking and financial management, making him an excellent addition to the Clusterbusters Board of Directors as Treasurer. He has served on the board since 2018 and has a special interest in pediatric cluster headaches as he’s been treatment refractory since the age of 12.
Mary Franklin
Board Member
Mary's Bio
Mary Franklin retired as the Executive Director of the National Headache Foundation on November 3, 2021 – a post she had held since June, 2016. She joined the National Headache Foundation staff in September, 2011 as Director of Operations. She previously held several positions at the Diamond Headache Clinic in Chicago in the nursing and the administrative departments. She retired from the Clinic as Vice President of Publishing and Administration in September, 2011.
Until it ceased publication, Mary was the Managing Editor of the magazine, Head Wise. Previously, she served as Managing Editor of the professional journals, Headache Quarterly, and Headache and Pain – Current Treatment and Research. She has authored several articles on headache, and with Doctor Seymour Diamond is the coauthor of Conquering Your Migraine (2001) and Headache Through the Ages (2005).
A native Chicagoan, she received a Master of Arts in Chicago Studies at Loyola University Chicago, where she had studied nursing. She also received a B.Ph. degree in History from Northwestern University in Evanston.
Currently, she lives in Evanston, IL, and thoroughly enjoys the company of her 7-year-old granddaughter, Madeline. She continues in headache advocacy as an emeritus member of the Coalition for Headache and Migraine Patients (CHAMP), and serves as Chair of its Governance Committee. Mary has volunteered for Miles for Migraine and has participated in several Headache on the Hill events.
Joseph McKay
Board Member
Joe's Bio
Joe is a retired FDNY firefighter who spends his time advocating for causes close to his heart, With Clusterbusters/AHDA, Joe is a patient advocate for the Headache on the Hill event where he helps lobby Congress for increased recognition of, and more equitable policies toward Americans with disabling headache disorders. Joe also advocated along side fellow first responders and Jon Stewart in 2015 and 2019 to get 9/11 health and compensation bills passed, and again with Burn Pits 360 to help pass the PACT Act in 2022. He also serves on the board of the the Ray Pfeifer Foundation, helping 9/11 first responders with medical needs.
Joe graduated from Devry Technical Institute in 1988 and worked for Otis elevator local one I.U.E.C. until 1998 when he became a New York City firefighter. He now lives in New Jersey with his wife and two children.
Medical Advisory Board
Mark Burish, MD, PhD
Dr. Burish's Bio
Dr. Burish received his MD PhD in the Vanderbilt Medical Scientist Training Program. He completed his neurology residency at the University of California at San Francisco, his fellowship in interventional pain management in the department of Anesthesiology at UCSF, and later obtained headache certification as an attending through the UCNS practice track. Dr. Burish’s cluster headache research surrounds epidemiology as well as basic science circadian mechanisms.
Brian E. McGeeney, MD, MPH, MBA
Dr. McGeeney's Bio
Dr. McGeeney received his medical degree from University College Dublin, Ireland, before completing a neurology residency, pain fellowship and Master of Public Health (epidemiology and biostatistics) at Boston University and Boston Medical Center. He obtained boards in Neurology, with added qualification (board) in Pain Medicine, and the UCNS board in Headache Medicine. He was an assistant to the Boston University Neurology Residency director, an assistant professor of neurology, actively involved in the education of the residents and students. Recently he moved to the JR Graham Headache Center, division of Headache Medicine, Department of Neurology, Brigham & Women’s Hospital, Boston, MA, Harvard Medical School. Dr. McGeeney is an associate editor of the journal Headache and since 2006 secretary of the Headache Cooperative of New England. Dr. McGeeney obtained a Master of Business Administration (Health Sector) from Boston University Questrum School of Business. Dr. McGeeney has lectured widely and published on topics involving Headache Medicine and Pain.
Christopher Gottschalk, M.D.
Dr. Gottschalk's Bio
Dr. Gottschalk was an undergraduate at Johns Hopkins University, studying molecular biology and assisting Dr. RCC Huang in cloning intracisternal A-particle genes before the PCR revolution. In 1984, with a BA in organic biochemistry, he moved to France to study French literature and philology at the Sorbonne and then cloned whooping cough genes at the Pasteur Institute in the laboratory of Antoine Danchin before returning to his native NYC to attend medical school at the Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons, “P&S”. He remained at Columbia for residency at the Neurological Institute of NY and then a two-year research fellowship continuing research into alkaloid chemistry using brain imaging to investigate the neurobiology of cocaine abuse. During that time he also interned at the country’s oldest headache specialty clinic, the Montefiore Headache Unit—birthplace of Fioricet and home to some of the world’s foremost headache researchers–training under Richard Lipton, Larry Newman, and Seymour Solomon. He took a faculty position at Yale in 1996 continuing substance abuse research, and then moved into full-time clinical practice of General Neurology from 2001-2009 after which he returned to Yale as full-time clinical faculty in Neurology.
Dr. Gottschalk is currently director of the Yale Headache and Facial Pain program and Chief of the section of General Neurology. This program provides training to medical students, residents in Neurology as well as Primary Care and fellows in Headache as well as Pain Medicine. Dr. Gottschalk’s primary research interest is in education—from neurology trainees and Primary Care physicians to the general public—regarding the facts of Headache disorders and the fictions that interfere with their recognition and treatment. He is active in curriculum development at the American Headache Society (AHS), working to establish milestones for Headache Medicine knowledge and practice over the full range of medical education programs. He was UCNS board-certified in Headache Medicine in 2012. Dr. Gottschalk was fortunate to have worked briefly with Andrew Sewell in his tenure at Yale and proud that we have carried on his project to study the use of psilocybin in primary headache disorders.
William B. Young, MD
Dr. Young's Bio
William B. Young, MD is a board-certified neurologist. He is Professor of Neurology, Co-Director of the In-Patient Program at the Jefferson Headache Center, and member of the Pharmacy and Therapeutics Committee and member of the Opioid Task Force at Thomas Jefferson University.
Dr. Young is a graduate of Haverford College in Haverford, Pennsylvania. He received his medical degree from the Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine. He interned at St. Elizabeth’s Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts, and completed a residency in neurology at Tufts University School of Medicine and The New England School of Medicine in Boston.
Dr. Young is a fellow of the American Headache Society, American Academy of Neurology, American Neurological Association, and the College of Physicians of Philadelphia. He is past President of the Alliance for Headache Disorders Advocacy, physician advisor to the Coalition for Headache and Migraine Patients (CHAMP), and President of Miles for Migraine. He is a graduate of the Palatucci Advocacy program of the American Academy of Neurology. He is also a peer reviewer for Cephalalgia, Headache, and Neurology.
Dr. Young’s publications include many peer-reviewed articles, book chapters, and miscellaneous publications. His special interests include migraine stigma, migraine phenomenology, and the treatment of intractable migraine.
Emmanuelle Schindler, MD, PhD
Dr. Schindler's Bio
Dr. Schindler is a board-certified Neurologist at Yale School of Medicine and has expertise in headache medicine. Among her efforts to optimize the management of headache disorders, she has executed the first controlled trials investigating the effects of psilocybin in cluster headache. Previously, Dr. Schindler studied the neuropharmacology of psychedelics and other serotonergic compounds in the context of receptor binding and intracellular signaling. She is using this and other areas of research as she seeks to identify the source of the headache-suppressing effects of psychedelic compounds. Dr. Schindler is also working to increase awareness about oxygen therapy in cluster headache.