Dr. Nancy Foldvary-Schafer currently serves as Director of the Sleep Disorders Center and staff in the Adult Epilepsy Center at the Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio. She is Professor of Medicine at the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine. Certified by the American Board of Neurology and Psychiatry in Neurology, Clinical Neurophysiology, Sleep Medicine and Epilepsy Medicine, she has treated patients with sleep disorders and epilepsy at the Cleveland Clinic since 1995. Under her leadership, the Cleveland Clinic Sleep Medicine program has undergone substantial growth including the establishment of 10 sleep laboratories and a multidisciplinary physician team spanning across neurology, psychiatry, psychology, pulmonary medicine, family and internal medicine, and pediatric specialties. She has served as a lead investigator on epilepsy, sleep apnea and narcolepsy clinical trials and has written extensively on sleep and epilepsy and women’s health and epilepsy. In 2016, Dr. Foldvary-Schaefer was appointed to the Cleveland Clinic Board of Governors. She serves on numerous national, regional, and local committees and is the author of two books and the lead editor of two books including Sleep Disorders: A Case a Week from the Cleveland Clinic, 2nd Edition, published in 2019. Also, in 2019, she received the Women’s Professional Staff Association Champion Award. She is the recipient of a $2.1 million philanthropic gift to advance education and awareness of sleep disorders.

Anita Afzali, MD, MPH, MHCM, is a Professor of Clinical Medicine and a gastroenterologist that specializes in Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD). She has recently transitioned to the University of Cincinnati after successfully building the first standalone multidisciplinary IBD Center and serving as the Medical Director at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center for five years. Dr. Afzali is now the Executive Vice Chair of the Department of Internal Medicine at the University of Cincinnati and Associate Chief Medical Officer of UC Health Systems and Cincinnati Children’s Hospital. She received her medical degree and completed both an Internal Medicine residency and Gastroenterology fellowship at the University of Washington in Seattle, WA. While in fellowship, Dr. Afzali worked in outcomes research and epidemiology and graduated with a Master’s in Public Health. She recently obtained an additional Master’s in Health Care Management for physician executive leadership and business administration from Harvard University. Her areas of research interest include clinical outcomes and clinical trials for investigative therapies and diagnostics in IBD. She is a healthcare redesign leader with interests in clinical operations and transformative medical care delivery. Dr. Afzali has extensive peer-reviewed publications and is a clinical trialist in over 20 investigative drug and diagnostic trials. She is also an invited lecturer on national and international programs and serves on several international advisory boards and scientific committees. Dr. Afzali is the incoming Chair of the American College of Gastroenterology (ACG) Educational Affairs Committee and the incoming Chair of the World Gastroenterology Organization (WGO) Publications Committee, as well as Co-Editor of the WGO quarterly global newsletters.