Consultant Neurologist
Dr Simona Balestrini
"We are at a very exciting time in our research into epilepsy. Genetic sequencing is beginning to generate large amounts of information with the potential to help us understand more about the causes of epilepsy and how we can best treat the condition."
Dr Simona Balestrini is the Muir Maxwell Trust Research Fellow at Epilepsy Society and Honorary Clinical Associate Professor at UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology.
Professional background
Dr Balestrini qualified in medicine and completed her specialist training in neurology at the Polytechnic University of Marche, Ancona, Italy. She was awarded her PhD in human health at the same University in 2017. During her training, Simona spent some time at UCL as a research fellow in the field of epilepsy genetics, and also visited the “C. Munari” Epilepsy Surgery Unit at Niguarda Hospital, Milan, Italy where she focused on neurophysiology and surgical treatment of epilepsy.
Dr Simona Balestrini is an Associate Professor of Child Neurology and Psychiatry at the Department of Neuroscience and Medical Genetics, Meyer Children's Hospital IRCSS, and the University of Florence, Italy. She is also a Consultant Neurologist at the Chalfont Centre for Epilepsy and the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, UCLH, as well as a Senior Clinical Research Fellow at the UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology.
She specializes in epilepsy genetics, rare and complex neurodevelopmental disorders, and neurophysiology. Her research focuses on genomic and neurophysiological tools to understand the causes, course, and treatment response of epilepsy, with the aim of translating findings into personalised treatments. She has made significant contributions to rare and complex neurological conditions, including studies on genotype-phenotype correlations, neuroimaging, and biomarkers for neurological disorders.
Affiliations
Meyer Children’s Hospital IRCSS, University of Florence, University College of London (UCL), University College of London Hospitals (UCLH)
Memberships
International League Against Epilepsy (ILAE), Royal College of Physicians (RCP), Association of British Neurologists (ABN).
Research Interests
Pharmacogenomics
Next-generation sequencing
Phenotype – genotype correlation
Multimodal approach to epilepsy phenotyping, including optical coherence tomography (OCT), 3D stereophotogrammetry and dense surface models (DSM) and transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS)
Publications
All publications: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=balestrini+S
Our research
Neuropathology
The Epilepsy Society Brain and Tissue Bank is the first of its kind in the UK. It is dedicated to the study of epilepsy through brain and other tissue samples.
Genomics
Read how we are working to understand the genetic architecture of each individual person's epilepsy through our world leading genomics research programme.
Neuroimaging
Neuroimaging enables us to look deep inside the brain to learn more about the impact of seizures on its structure and function.