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Kenneth Heilman, Ph.D., a distinguished professor of neurology at the UF College of Medicine and a member of UF's McKnight Brain Institute, was elected to honorary membership in the American Neurological Association, the highest honor the ANA can bestow.

"This (recognition) is reserved for those few individuals who have made unique contributions to neurology and neurological science," according to Timothy A. Pedley, M.D., president of the ANA. Heilman will be formally introduced as an honorary member at the executive session of the ANA in Salt Lake City on Sept. 23.

In addition, Heilman has been invited to deliver the 2009 Robert Wartenberg Lecture at the American Academy of Neurology's annual meeting in April. Awarded annually by the AAN's Science Committee, the lectureship is given to a neurologist for excellence in clinically relevant research.

The recent recipient of the UF College of Medicine's Lifetime Achievement Award, Heilman is the author, co-author or editor of 11 books and more than 500 publications. He received his medical degree from the University of Virginia in 1963 and spent two years training in internal medicine at Cornell University Medical Center.

During the Vietnam War, Heilman joined the Air Force and was chief of medicine at NATO Hospital, Izmir, Turkey. When he left the service, he accepted a neurology residency and fellowship at Boston City Hospital, before coming to the University of Florida. In 1977, Heilman joined the Veterans Affairs faculty in a part-time status, first as a staff neurologist and since 1996 as chief of the neurology service.

Today he is an active clinician, researcher and director of the memory and cognitive disorder clinic.