She obtained her BA in Chemistry from Indiana University of Pennsylvania in 1981. She was an award winning high school teacher of Chemistry and Physics for the first 10 years of her career. In 1993, she sought her degree in medicine at the University of Pittsburgh. Her internship was as an Internal Medicine intern at the University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) after which she completed a neurology residency at the University of Virginia. She stayed at the University of Virginia where she completed a Neurocritical Care Fellowship and served as a Clinical Instructor in the Department of Neurology.