Leadership
The ravaging effects of cognitive decline from behavior-related chronic diseases take an enormous toll on families and communities. Apollo Health understands this battle, providing invaluable medical information needed to “flip the script” and disrupt the inevitability of cognitive decline.
Our leadership team brings diverse experiences and expertise to this challenge, while our technology streamlines the journey each of our community members embarks on to manage their brain health while providing vital information and analysis to the practitioner.
Dale Bredesen, M.D.
Chief Science Officer – Brain Health
is a neuroscientist and neurologist, professor, and author in the field of neurodegenerative diseases. He was the founding President and CEO of the Buck Institute for Research on Aging, and his laboratory research over 30 years has focused on the mechanisms underlying neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s, leading to the first successful reversals of cognitive decline in Alzheimer’s disease, published in 2014, 2016, and 2018. Dr. Bredesen is a prodigious innovator in medicine, with over 30 patents to his name. Some of his over 220 scholarly publications and case studies include:
Reversal of Cognitive Decline: 100 Patients describes 100 patients, treated by several different physicians trained in the ReCODE protocol, with documented improvement in cognition, in some cases with documentation of improvement in electrophysiology or imaging as well. This additional report provides further support for a randomized, controlled clinical trial of the protocol and the overall approach. (Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease and Parkinsonism 2018)
Reversal of cognitive decline in Alzheimer’s disease and Reversal of cognitive decline: a novel therapeutic program gave the first descriptions of the reversal of cognitive decline in patients with early Alzheimer’s disease or its precursors, MCI (mild cognitive impairment) and SCI (subjective cognitive impairment). (Impact Journals: Aging 2014 and 2016)
Transcriptional Effects of ApoE4: Relevance to Alzheimer’s Disease explained how ApoE4 acts as a transcription factor and binds to the promoters of genes involved in a range of processes linked to aging and AD disease pathogenesis. These findings point to novel therapeutic strategies for AD and aging, resulting in an extension of the human health span, the disease-free and functional period of life. (Molecular Neurobiology 2018)
Dr. Bredesen put much of his research and translation into the 2017 New York Times bestseller The End of Alzheimer’s: The First Program to Prevent and Reverse Cognitive Decline, now available in 30 languages.
After graduating from Caltech and earning his MD from Duke University, he was the Chief Resident in Neurology at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). While at UCSF, he joined Nobel Laureate Prof. Stanley Prusiner’s laboratory and was later appointed to his Institute for Neurodegenerative Diseases.
Dr. Bredesen is the senior director of Precision Brain Health at Pacific Neuroscience Institute® and the chief scientific officer for Apollo Health. He joined the Buck Institute in 1998 as its founding President and CEO. He previously held faculty positions at the University of California, San Francisco, and the University of California, San Diego.
Lance Kelly
CEO
Lance Kelly has over 25 years of experience leading engineering and design teams focused on consumer technology. His executive management track record has multiple examples of delivering innovative and successful products even in challenging markets.
Before co-founding Apollo Health as COO and co-chair, he held senior management positions in product development at Apple Computer, Exodus Communications, Centrata, and ePlay.
Additionally, Lance served as Chief of Studio Operations at Total Entertainment Network and Vice President of Software Engineering and Operations for Pogo.com, where he was also a co-founder. Both Pogo.com and Centrata were KPCB companies funded by Vinod Khosla. Mr. Kelly led Pogo.com’s product development team from its inception to create an industry-leading user experience which led to the company’s acquisition by Electronic Arts.
Julie Gregory
Chief Health Liaison
Julie is the founder and president of the ApoE4.Info non-profit, a grassroots organization of ApoE4 carriers working to prevent and reverse Alzheimer’s disease and among the many who have recovered their cognitive health using the Bredesen Protocol. Sharing the knowledge she gained from reversing her cognitive decline, she’s collaborated with Dr. Bredesen and his integrative physician wife, Dr. Aida Lasheen Bredesen, to write the handbook portion of the New York Times bestseller “The End of Alzheimer’s Program”. Julie integrates her background in journalism, public relations, and counseling, with her passion for cognitive health to serve as a protocol educator in a consulting role with Apollo Health. You can read her story in The First Survivors of Alzheimer’s.”
Rammohan Rao, Ph.D.
Principal Research Scientist
Ram holds a doctorate degree in Biochemistry and Neurosciences and up until now was a Research Associate Professor of Neuroscience at the Buck Institute for Research on Aging, Novato, CA. His research focus was in the areas of chronic stress, neuronal cell death, and mechanisms of age-associated neurodegenerative diseases, with special emphasis on Alzheimer’s disease. Ram has 20+ years of research and teaching experience in Neuroscience and has published more than 50 peer-reviewed papers in scientific journals and chapters in a couple of textbooks. Ram has supervised and trained several high school students, college interns, research technicians, and post-doctoral fellows. Ram is also a board-certified Ayurveda practitioner and a registered yoga teacher. He teaches Ayurveda and Yoga at the California College of Ayurveda. He is also the author of a recently published best-selling book-“Good Living Practices”-The best from Ayurveda, Yoga and Modern Science For Achieving Optimal Health, Happiness and Longevity.
Christine Coward, MSW, PCC
VP Coaching
Christine “Chris” Coward has a background in clinical social work and has been coaching since 2004. In 1991, she obtained her MSW in Social Work at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Chris is Vice President of Coaching Services for Apollo Health, running the HabitChange business unit. In 2009 while at Neumann University she co-developed and taught a 125-hour coach-training program that evolved into HabitChange. Since 2009, HabitChange has been credentialed and accredited by the International Coach Federation (ICF).
Chris works closely with Dr. Bredesen as an evangelist and coach for participants of the ReCODE Program to reverse cognitive impairment. She is a member of the ICF and formerly served on the board for the Philadelphia Area Coach Alliance. Chris is currently the President-Elect of ICF’s Colorado chapter.
Cyrus A. Raji, M.D.
Chief Neuroimaging Science Advisor
Dr. Cyrus Raji joined the Neuroradiology faculty and the Neuroimaging Laboratories faculty as an Assistant Professor at the Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology in 2018. He has trained at prestigious institutions for both clinical medicine and research: M.D./Ph.D. at the University of Pittsburgh, Diagnostic Radiology Residency at UCLA, and National Institutes of Health (NIH), and Neuroradiology Fellowships at UCSF. Dr. Raji has coined the term “Preventive Neuroradiology” to detail the use of brain imaging biomarkers to understand the influence of lifestyle on overall brain health and future risk for Alzheimer’s. The New York Times, CNN, and the BBC have covered his scientific work in this area. His research has received the Radiological Society of North America’s (RSNA) Roentgen Award, and the American Society of Neuroradiology (ASNR), RSNA, and the NIH have funded him. He was also a recipient of the 2017 American Society of Neuroradiology Boeger Award Grant for Alzheimer’s Imaging research.