Stephanie K Tankou, MD, PhD

Stephanie K. Tankou, MD, PhD, is an Assistant Professor of Neurology at Mount Sinai Health System, and sees patients at the Corinne Goldsmith Dickinson Center for Multiple Sclerosis, with a clinical focus in multiple sclerosis (MS), neuromyelitis optica, and neurosarcoidosis. Dr. Tankou has an established research lab focusing on identifying gut derived bacteria that regulate inflammation in the central nervous system (CNS), setting the goal to identify gut derived bacteria that can serve as biomarkers as well as disease modifying therapies for MS and other CNS autoimmune diseases.

Dr. Tankou received her Bachelor's in Science in Biology with a minor in Chemistry, graduating summa cum laude, from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She completed her MD/PhD degree at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine where her graduate research revealed a mechanism by which cytomegalovirus interferes with the function of a susceptibility gene for mental illness called disrupted in schizophrenia-1. She completed her neurology residency at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center and later completed her MS Clinical Research Fellowship at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

She was awarded the NMSS-ABF MS Clinician-Scientist Development Award to investigate the gut microbiome in MS patients as well as in the MS mouse model in the laboratory of Dr. Howard Weiner at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Tankou is a co-author on the first research article describing Alterations of the Human Gut Microbiome in Multiple Sclerosis patients, published in the 2016 edition of Nature Communications.

Dr. Tankou led a pilot probiotic trial in MS patients, documenting the first report on the effect of a probiotic on the gut microbiota composition and peripheral immune function in MS patients. She observed that it is possible to change the composition of the gut microbiota of MS patients as well as their peripheral immune response by probiotic supplementation. This work was published in Annals of Neurology, a leading journal in the field of clinical neurology.

Dr. Tankou is fluent in English and French.  She offers telemedicine appointments when appropriate.  Please call her office to schedule a video visit.

The state of Florida requires out-of-state professionals who are registered to provide telehealth services to display a hyperlink to the Florida Department of Health telehealth web page. This allows Florida patients who are receiving medical care by telehealth to confirm the provider’s licensure and Florida registration.