June 17, 2026

Dear ASENT friend and colleague,

It is with a heavy heart that we inform you that our Executive Director, Jessica Keenan Smith, passed away Saturday night, peacefully and bravely after a long illness. We extend our deep condolences to her husband Ted, her daughter Carolyn, and the rest of her family.

While we are still processing our unfortunate loss, we write to you now to recognize and honor Jessica’s contributions to ASENT and her advocacy for people living with neurological diseases.

Jessica served as the Executive Director of ASENT since 2017. When she joined our society in an executive role, she brought management stability, revitalized committee activities, and improved meeting planning and strategic direction which produced the series of vibrant annual meetings bringing together the unique demographics of ASENT to advance translational research for people with neurological diseases. She worked tirelessly to advocate for and welcome academic investigators, industry researchers, entrepreneurs, advocacy groups, regulatory scientists from the FDA, NIH program officials, as well as patients and their families to ASENT. As ASENT’s Executive Director, Jessica was instrumental in the establishment of the successful development of the ASENT Clinical Trials course, and in nurturing our growing partnership with the Japanese Society of Neurological Therapeutics. Her administrative leadership truly had international impact for neurotherapeutics.

Welcoming people and families afflicted with neurological diseases as ASENT meeting participants and members was a particular passion for Jessica, long before the importance of patient perspectives for therapeutic development was recognized by professional organizations. Some of you may also be aware that in 2009, Jessica founded the Living Well with Epilepsy organization and website, which has been a successful and rich resource for people and coping with epilepsy. She has been a life-long advocate to advance neurotherapeutics as well as empowering women of childbearing age who are also living with epilepsy (link to resources and manuscript). Jessica was committed to improving health outcomes as well patient experiences. 

To celebrate her, we are establishing the Jessica Smith Advocacy Award to be given each year at the ASENT Annual Meeting. The annual award will provide an honorarium and travel expenses for the individual or individuals in academia, industry, advocacy, or government, whose work is significantly advancing the cause of neurotherapeutic development on behalf of patients.

We are grateful to you all for your many contributions to ASENT over the years. We hope you will join us in honoring Jessica’s legacy of tireless work and advocacy to advance neurotherapeutics.

Sincerely yours,

Ludy, Andy, and Tom

Ludy Shih, MD, MMSc, President

Andrew J. Cole, MD, FRCPC, Past President

Thomas Sutula, MD, PhD, Past President