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Our Mission
Creating a future where everyone in the world with headache can thrive in optimal, functional and connected lives.
To fulfill our mission, the National Headache Foundation is guided by our core pillars:
Resilient & Functional
Living
- Embrace personalized strategies in self-management for thriving amidst headaches, giving you the freedom to achieve optimal functionality and well-being in order to reclaim your life.
- Walking the path to acceptance that headache-migraine is a part of your life. Confidence that this will get better with the right toolbox of scientific resources, skills, and support that will allow you to live your best life with joy and hope.
Medical Understanding & Advancements
- Recognition that headache-migraine is a disabling public health issue: underdiagnosed and undertreated, and deserves to be addressed to reduce chronification and burden of disease.
- Awareness and education around the medical breakthroughs in diagnosis, treatment, prevention and care, with patients, caregivers, general healthcare practitioners, payers, and policymakers.
Community Insights & Engagement
- The NHF community is dedicated to advocacy, support, and education, working together to increase acceptance without stigma, deploy people-first language, improve access to quality care, and champion for the needs of those living with headache disorders.
- Unencumbered and timely access to an accurate diagnosis resulting in optimal care and treatment -pharmacologic and non-pharmacologic.
Our Story
For over 50 years, our mission at the National Headache Foundation has been to further awareness of headache and migraine as legitimate neurological diseases. With aid from advanced technology and clinical innovation, there are more care and treatment options than ever before.
NHF understands that these diseases are still largely misunderstood, underdiagnosed, and undertreated. Additionally, the personal and societal burdens of pain, disability, diminished quality of life and financial cost is under-recognized. We are honored to have you on this journey, as there is so much we can do together.
NHF continuously collects the latest comprehensive information on headache disorders and migraine disease, which we make freely available to you.
Every day, our health care provider finder connects patients, who have just begun to seek treatment or those who are looking for more options.
NHF is committed to building the bridges needed to ensure that everyone affected by headache and migraine are able to fully engage and thrive in their best lives.
Please join the National Headache Foundation in cultivating connections and partnerships that inspire action and instill hope.
National Headache Foundation Team
Katy Oakley
CEO & Executive Director
Katie Andrews
CEO Executive Assistant
Maureen Ballay
AVP, Finance, Operations & Administration
Diego Colón
Associate Director, Military Community
Zachary Figliuolo
Associate Director, Digital Communications
David Lee
Strategic Development Advisor
Fabiola Palomo
Program and Communications Associate
Susan Stone, MBA
Strategic Advisor
National Headache Foundation Board
Hope O’Brien, MD, MBA, FAHS, FAAN
Headache Medicine: UCNS
Cincinnati, OH
About Our President
Dr. Hope O’Brien is originally from Queens, New York, with parents of Jamaican descent. She is board certified in Neurology and Headache Medicine and holds an Executive MBA degree. She serves as founder, CEO and medical director of Headache Center of Hope, a direct-patient care and concierge Neurology practice in Cincinnati, Ohio, with specialized focus on patients of all ages impacted by recurrent headaches. Her research focuses on late adolescents and young adults with headaches, and she has written and contributed to over 75 peer-reviewed publications, abstracts, and book chapters.
Dr. O’Brien is an adjunct professor at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine and is a consultant for TriHealth hospital physicians. She is a Fellow of the American Headache Society and American Academy of Neurology. Currently, she is a member of the accreditation committee of the United Council of Neurological Subspecialties and the Medscape/AHS Advisory Board Migraine Center of Excellence. She is also the Vice Chair of the Meeting Management Committee of the American Academy of Neurology.
Corporate Leadership Council
The National Headache Foundation would like to thank our Corporate Leadership Council members for their support of our mission.
Pearl
Find out how you can become a member of the National Headache Foundation’s Corporate Leadership Council by contacting [email protected]
Patient Leadership Council
The National Headache Foundation’s Patient Leadership Council (PLC) consists of people living with migraine disease and headache disorders who are partnering with the NHF to help improve the quality of care and resources provided to patients by advising the NHF on initiatives and advocacy opportunities. By including the PLC in the decision-making process, we gain valuable insights into the patient experience.
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