In response to COVID-19, the Functional Neurological Disorder Society administrative offices are currently closed.
FNDS staff are continuing to work remotely and are able to assist via email. For a list of each staff member’s email address, please visit the Contact Us page.
The FNDS Board of Directors has decided to postpone the conference until 2021. Click above for details.
The 4th International Conference on Functional Neurological Disorders will bring together leading international experts from a range of backgrounds including neurology, physiology, psychiatry, psychology and ethics.
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Joining FNDS means being part of a multi-disciplinary group with a shared interest in this fascinating and evolving field and a shared mission to advance scientific research and improve the diagnosis and treatment of patients with functional neurological disorders.
FNDS is accepting applications for the life-long “Founding Membership” designation until June 2020 from individuals either in training or with an advanced degree or certification in a related field of study.
Visit our Membership page for more information.
(72 days remain)
In September 2017, Mark Hallett, Jon Stone and Alan Carson organized a 3-day international meeting for health professionals on FND in Edinburgh on the back of a volume of the Handbook of Clinical Neurology on FND[1]. 550 delegates attended and there was enthusiasm for further similar meetings in the future.
We were very grateful at that meeting for the support of the International Parkinson and Movement Disorder Society (MDS), the American Epilepsy Society, NIH, NIMH and messages of goodwill from the American Neuropsychiatric Association and the British Neuropsychiatric Association.
All these organizations, and others, have been instrumental in improving research, teaching and awareness of functional/psychogenic disorders in neurological settings, especially the MDS, which sponsored two previous meetings on functional movement disorders and has an FND workgroup, the ILAE, which has a task force on psychogenic non-epileptic seizures, and the ANPA, which is drawing up new guidelines for FND.
The field matured and covers a wide range of health disciplines including neurology, psychiatry, psychology, physiotherapy, occupational therapy, rehabilitation medicine, ophthalmology, neuro-otology and others.
We plan to organize further meetings as a place to bring together this diverse group and think that the time is right for a new organization to bring together those interested in these common and disabling disorders.
We recently incorporated the FNDS, invited an initial advisory group of 39 individuals, and are planning a 2020 meeting.
[1]M. Hallett, J. Stone, A. Carson (eds), Functional Neurologic Disorders: Handbook of Clinical Neurology (Volume 139), Elsevier, Amsterdam, 2016.
