Rohit Dhall, M.D. Neurologist

Clinical Biography

Dr. Dhall is an associate professor of neurology and the director of neurodegenerative disorders. He previously directed clinical trials at the Parkinson’s Institute in Northern California, where he also served as the director of the National Parkinson Foundation (NPF) Center of Excellence.

Dr. Dhall received his medical degree at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in 2000. He went on to complete a six-month post-doctoral training in psychiatry at AIIMS and then relocated to the United States. He obtained a Master of Science in Epidemiology from the University of Texas at Houston School of Public Health and completed his internship in medicine at the University of Texas at Houston. He went on to complete his residency at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) followed by a two-year fellowship in clinical movement disorders and deep brain stimulation (DBS) at UAB.

After completing his training, he joined the Muhammad Ali Parkinson Center in Phoenix, Arizona, as the medical director of neuromodulation and also directed the National Parkinson Foundation (NPF) Center of Excellence there. His main responsibilities involved management of Parkinson’s disease through advanced therapies including DBS surgery and providing intraoperative neurophysiology support for DBS. Under Dr. Dhall’s leadership, the Muhammad Ali Parkinson Center at Barrow Neurological Institute ascended to one of the top surgical DBS programs in the country (by volume of new implants) and established a robust pipeline of industry sponsored and investigator initiated trials. His clinical research focuses around evaluating novel medical therapies and devices for managing Parkinson’s disease. Dr. Dhall also provided oversight and direction to the Muhammad Ali Parkinson Center’s outreach, education, and support program for over 1,000 people living with Parkinson’s and their families.

As director of the NPF Center of Excellence at the Muhammad Ali Parkinson Center and then at the Parkinson’s Institute, Dr. Dhall collaborated with other NPF Centers of Excellence in the NPF Quality Improvement Initiative, which assesses the factors determining quality of life and treatment response in Parkinson’s disease with the goal of continually improving care for people living with Parkinson’s and their care-partners. Additionally, Dr. Dhall has worked with researchers from the Arizona State University (ASU) Biomedical Informatics and Bio-Engineering Department as well as others to develop feedback systems to improve gait and excursion amplitude and self-evaluation tools using smartphones and wearable sensors.

As an educator, Dr. Dhall shares UAMS’s deep commitment to nurturing the next generation of Parkinson’s disease researchers and neurologists. At Muhammad Ali Parkinson’s Center, he mentored six movement disorders fellows who are now in practice and 11 neurology residents throughout their six-month outpatient clinic blocks, a doctoral student at ASU who now is working for industry, and high school and medical students during their mentored clinical research projects. He has authored many research articles on neurological topics and has presented his work in the United States and abroad.