NASHVILLE, TN, August 07, 2017 /24-7PressRelease/ -- Marquis Who's Who, the world's premier publisher of biographical profiles, is proud to name Dr. Arthur S. Walters a Lifetime Achiever. An accomplished listee, Dr. Walters celebrates many years' experience in his professional network, and has been noted for achievements, leadership qualities, and the credentials and successes he has accrued in his field. As in all Marquis Who's Who biographical volumes, individuals profiled are selected on the basis of current reference value. Factors such as position, noteworthy accomplishments, visibility, and prominence in a field are all taken into account during the selection process.
Since 2008, Dr. Walters has served as a full-time professor of neurology at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine in Nashville, Tenn., continuing the research he began as a young physician in movement disorders and sleep disorders. He was inspired by his mother's side of the family, composed of creative and socially active physicians and scientists, and contributed to a field devoid of studies at the time. Ultimately, Dr. Walters combined his specializations and has become a pioneer in the development of the field of sleep-related movement disorders.
Dr. Walters graduated with a medical degree from the Wayne State University School of Medicine in 1972, and further studied neurology with the SUNY Downstate Medical Center and the Neurological Institute at Columbia University. He has served numerous institutions of health in his 45-year career, notably the U.S. Veterans Affairs health system, the UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, the New Jersey Neuroscience Institute, Seton Hall University School of Graduate Medical Education and briefly as a visiting professor with the Georg-August University of Goettingen, Germany. Dr. Walters was selected by the American Academy of Sleep Medicine to head the formulation of new diagnostic clinical criteria for sleep-related movement disorders and to standardize new polysomnographic scoring criteria for the conditions. Those standards were published in the "International Classification of Sleep Disorders 2 and 3" for the American Academy of Sleep Medicine in 2005 and 2014 as well as The AASM Manual for the Scoring of Sleep and Associated Events, released in 2007. Dr. Walters also co-edited the first book on sleep-related movement disorders in 2003 with a revised edition 2013.
Dr. Walters is perhaps best known for his work on restless legs syndrome (RLS), and has determined that the condition is tied to the circadian rhythm of the human body. He published the first full case reports of RLS in childhood. He has also done pioneering research on the treatment of RLS by opioids, dopaminergic agents and the alpha 2 delta channel anticonvulsants. He has made original contributions to the connection between RLS and the body's own opioids, the endorphins and enkephalins, the connection between RLS and hypertension, heart disease and stroke, the connection between childhood RLS and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and Growing Pains, and the connection between RLS and gastrointestinal disease. From 1993 to 2007, he founded and served as the first chair of the International Restless Legs Syndrome Study Group (IRLSSG), comprised of more than 130 physicians and scientists from 17 countries. They are dedicated to research on RLS and its allied condition Periodic Limb Movements in Sleep (PLMS). Under his leadership, universal clinical criteria for the diagnosis of RLS were established and the first validated scale for the scoring of RLS severity was created and validated. This scale is now used as the primary outcome measure in all the major pharmaceutical company studies of RLS. Dr. Walters continues as an active member of the IRLSSG board. He was also the first chair of the medical advisory board of the Restless Legs Syndrome Foundation (RLSF) from 1992 to 1998, which offers aid to families suffering from the condition through 70 nationwide patient support groups. He continues as well as an active member of the board. He has contributed more than 300 published works to professional medical journals in the form of peer reviewed articles, editorials, and abstracts. Dr. Walters has been the recipient of research grants from the National Institutes of Health, The Department of Veterans Affairs as well as industry, foundation and university grants.
Dr. Walters has been honored with a plethora of awards, most recently as a 2017 Notable Alumnus of the School of Medicine at Wayne State University. He is the recipient of a 2010 Senior Sleep Science Award for excellence in sleep research from the American Academy of Neurology. He was honored as Researcher of the Year in Medicine by Seton Hall University (2003-2004). In 2008 he was awarded a Distinguished Faculty Medical License from the State of Tennessee and in that same year a 2008 Outstanding Sleep Teaching Award from the JFK Neuroscience Institute, formerly the New Jersey Neuroscience Institute He has also received a 2007 Distinguished Service Award and a 2012 Collaborative Research Award from the International Restless Legs Syndrome Study Group (IRLSSG) for being the individual most responsible for fostering collaboration among investigators on RLS research. In 1998 he received a Bronze Oak Leaf Distinguished Service Award from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and in that same year he was the recipient, of a Distinguished Service Award, "The Ekbom Award" from the Restless Legs Syndrome Foundation (RLSF) , Inc. Dr. Walters was selected for inclusion in numerous volumes of Who's Who in America, Who's Who in Medicine and Healthcare, Who's Who in Science and Engineering, Who's Who in the South and Southwest, and Who's Who in the World, as well as two volumes of Who's Who in the East, and the 1996-1997 volume of Who's Who in American Education. In his free time, he is a tennis player and an amateur competitive ballroom dancer who was the men's bronze level champion in the 2013-2016 US Pro-AM Ballroom Dance Championships. Dr. Walters is married to fellow Vanderbilt professor of cultural anthropology, Lesley Gill.
In recognition of outstanding contributions to his profession and the Marquis Who's Who community, Dr. Walters has been featured on the Marquis Who's Who Lifetime Achievers website. Please visit www.ltachievers.com for more information about this honor.
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