Dr. Schaumburg’s principal clinical and experimental research activities are focused upon the effect of environmental, occupational, and pharmaceutical chemicals on the nervous system. He has authored or co-authored over 100 papers on these subjects in the peer-reviewed literature, and is recognized as an authority in the field of neurotoxicology. He is co-editor, with Dr. Peter Spencer, of two editions of the standard textbook in the field, “Experimental and Clinical Neurotoxicology” (Oxford University Press 2000).
His active clinical practice is located in the Department of Neurology at the Montefiore Medical Center; he is available to travel to see patients or conduct clinical studies. His experimental studies, supported by extramural funds from governmental and non-governmental sources, are performed in the Neuropathology Laboratories at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine.
Dr. Schaumburg was given the Lifetime Achievement Award for Excellence in Teaching in May 2012. This is the summary read for the award ceremony: During his 48-year career at Einstein, Dr. Herbert Schaumburg, Professor of Neurology and of Pathology, has served this institution in multiple capacities: as a superb clinician and researcher, departmental leader, and consummate educator. He currently maintains a laboratory devoted to experimental neurotoxicology, an active clinical neurotoxicology practice at the Montefiore Medical Center, and is the neurology consultant for the New York City Poison Control Center at Bellevue Hospital. He has conducted evaluations of neurotoxic outbreaks in India, Egypt, and Latin America. Dr. Schaumburg has authored 118 papers in the peer-reviewed literature in neurotoxicology, and is co-editor of the textbooks Experimental and Clinical Neurotoxicology and Disorders of Peripheral Nerves. He was twice the recipient of the Moore Award at the annual meeting of the American Association of Neuropathology for his investigations of adrenoleukodystrophy. He has received extramural funding for his laboratory from the National Institute of Neurological and Communicative Disorders and Stroke, National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, and from industry. Dr. Schaumburg served as vice chair of the Department of Neurology from 1977-1984, as interim chair from 1984-1986, and as chair from 1986-2004. Long associated with the second-year Nervous System & Human Behavior course, Dr. Schaumburg is responsible for the peripheral neuropathy and neurotoxicology sections, as well as other clinical aspects of the course, and currently serves as its co-director with Dr. Joseph Arezzo. His students have praised him as a committed, energetic, and stimulating educator who is genuinely interested in fostering their learning. In recognition of his excellence in teaching, Dr. Schaumburg was elected to the Leo M. Davidoff Society in 1979. He is a graduate of Harvard College and the Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis. He completed a medical internship at Vanderbilt University Hospital, a neurology residency at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, and a fellowship in neuropathology at the Massachusetts General Hospital.