Dr. Denson G. Fujikawa, MD, FAAN, FANA, FAES

Expert Publications

• Lithium-pilocarpine-induced status epilepticus produces necrotic neurons with internucleosomal DNA fragmentation in adult rats.
• Kainic acid-induced seizures produce necrotic, not apoptotic, neurons with internucleosomal DNA cleavage: implications for programmed cell death mechanisms.
• Confusion between neuronal apoptosis and activation of programmed cell death mechanisms in acute necrotic insults.
• Status epilepticus-induced neuronal loss in humans without systemic complications or epilepsy.
• Seizure-induced neuronal necrosis: implications for programmed cell death mechanisms.
• Apoptosis: ignoring morphology and focusing on biochemical mechanisms will not eliminate confusion.
• Effects of AMPA-receptor and voltage-sensitive sodium channel blockade on high potassium-induced glutamate release and neuronal death in vivo.
• Nonconvulsive status epilepticus with frontal features: quantitating severity of subclinical epileptiform discharges provides a marker for treatment efficacy, recurrence and outcome.
• Caspase-3 is not activated in seizure-induced neuronal necrosis with internucleosomal DNA cleavage.
• Neuronal death in mesial temporal sclerosis: separating morphology from mechanism.
• Prolonged seizures and cellular injury: understanding the connection.
• Caspase-dependent programmed cell death pathways are not activated in generalized seizure-induced neuronal death.
• Mild as well as severe insults produce necrotic, not apoptotic, cells: evidence from 60-min seizures.
• Nuclear translocation of mitochondrial cytochrome c, lysosomal cathepsins B and D, and three other death-promoting proteins within the first 60 minutes of generalized seizures.
• Single-dose phenytoin infusion.

Media Releases

Get to know more about Neurologist Dr. Denson G. Fujikawa, who serves patients in Los Angeles, California.

Dr. Fujikawa is a highly trained neurologist and neuroscientist at the UCLA Brain Research Institute in Los Angeles, California.

The UCLA Brain Research Institute (BRI) is a catalyst for education, outreach, and research collaborations among current and future scientists, engineers, and clinicians who seek to understand the healthy and diseased brain.

Formed in 1959 by a small cadre of neuroscientists, the BRI is one of the first neuroscience research collectives established in the United States. Now with approximately 300 faculty members representing nearly 30 departments from 6 schools, the institute is UCLA’s central force in its mission to advance interdisciplinary basic and clinical neuroscience.

A member of the faculty at David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, Dr. Fujikawa joined the Department of Neurology as a Clinical Instructor in 1981. He has also been on staff at the Sepulveda VA Ambulatory Care Center since 1983, became an Adjunct Professor in 1996, and changed series to become a Health Sciences Clinical Professor of Neurology in 2011.

Receiving his Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology, magna cum laude, at Harvard University, Dr. Fujikawa earned his medical degree from the University of Southern California School of Medicine. He did two years of residency in general surgery at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center in New York, two years of residency in neurosurgery at UCLA Medical Center, then switched to neurology, completing his residency at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center in 1981. 

Thereafter, he spent two years as a research fellow in Dr. Claude Wasterlain’s Epilepsy Research Laboratory at Sepulveda. He spends half his time in clinical neurology, training UCLA neurology residents, with a subspecialty interest in epilepsy, and half his time doing basic research on in vivo mechanisms of naturally occurring apoptotic and pathologically induced necrotic neuronal death.

Possessing over five decades of clinical excellence, the doctor is board-certified in neurology by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology (ABPN). The ABPN is a not-for-profit corporation dedicated to promoting high-quality patient care for the public through the initial and continuing certification of psychiatrists and neurologists.

Achieving professional competence, Dr. Fujikawa is a Fellow of the American Academy of Neurology Fellow (FAAN), a Fellow of the American Neurological Association (FANA), and a Fellow of the 

Neurology is a branch of medicine dealing with disorders of the nervous system. Neurologists are licensed medical specialists who diagnose and treat disorders that affect the brain, spinal cord, nerves, and muscles of patients. They examine a patient’s mental and physical status, conduct medical tests and scans, and evaluate the results to diagnose and treat the patient.

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