About DSRTF :: Leadership

The Down Syndrome Research and Treatment Foundation (DSRTF) was founded in 2004 by a dedicated group of parents and leading scientists who are committed to finding treatments to improve cognition and prevent early dementia in persons with Down syndrome.

Founder’s Comments:

Patty White | Parent and Co-Founder DSRTF

DSRTF Board Members:

DSRTF is proud to have a strong Board of Directors. Each Member is passionately committed to the DSRTF Mission and has taken an active role in moving the organization forward and ensuring that DSRTF is effective in re-energizing the field of DS cognition research and setting the foundation for moving that research to treatment.

Patricia A. O’Brien White, Portola Valley, CA, DSRTF Board President

Patricia O’Brien White is currently a community volunteer and is a Co-Founder of DSRTF. Prior to her non-profit board service she spent 11 years at Hewlett Packard in roles such as Director of Marketing and Director of Strategic Planning. She also has been a Marketing Representative for IBM.

Patricia has an MBA from Harvard University and a BA in Economics from Georgetown University. She has served on the Boards of the National Down Syndrome Society, The Children’s Discovery Museum of San Jose and Palo Alto’s Community Association for Rehabilitation.

Patricia and her husband have four children. Their youngest child has Down syndrome and is currently fully included in her local kindergarten class.

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Darryl Mikuni, Los Angeles, CA , DSRTF Board CFO

Darryl has worked in Los Angeles for more than 20 years in various financial management positions at Northrop Corporation, Sony Pictures Entertainment, International Rectifier and Ticketmaster. His current position is Vice President, Finance and Treasurer for Abraxis BioScience, Inc., where he is responsible for treasury, insurance, risk management, credit & collections, and payroll.

Darryl has an MBA in Finance and Accounting from the University of Southern California and a BA in Management Science from U.C. San Diego. He served as a member of the Affiliate Advisory Board of the National Down Syndrome Society for three years and has been a Board member of the Down Syndrome Association of Los Angeles for the last eight years. Two of those eight were served as President of the Board.

Darryl and his wife have a 11 year old son, Christopher, who has Down syndrome, and is fully included in a fourth grade class at his local elementary school.  

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Betsy Plaschke, Atherton, CA, DSRTF Board Secretary

Betsy is an attorney who is currently Managing Counsel, Senior Corporate Counsel at Oracle Corporation. Prior to her work at Oracle she was an Associate at Morrison & Foerster. She also was a consultant to the Los Angeles Mayor’s Office on Disability.

Betsy holds a J.D. from the University of Santa Clara and a BA from Northwestern University.

Betsy and her husband have three children. She has a brother who has Down syndrome.

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Jim White, Portola Valley, CA, DSRTF Co-Founder

Jim is a Co-Founder of DSRTF and is currently a Managing Partner at Sutter Hill Ventures. Prior to his work at Sutter Hill, he was a VP of Marketing at Macromedia Inc. and General Manager of the Interactive Learning Division. Jim spent 8 years at Silicon Graphics where he helped to start and build their $1.5B 3D graphics workstation business. Jim began his career with the Hewlett Packard Company in the PC division, spending time in engineering, sales and product marketing.

Jim holds an MBA from Harvard University and has a BS in Industrial Engineering from Northwestern University.

Jim and his wife have four children. Their youngest has Down syndrome and is fully included in her local kindergarten class.

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Roger Kafker, Boston, MA, DSRTF Co-Founder

Roger is a Co-Founder of DSRTF as is currently a Managing Partner at TA Associates. Prior to joining TA, Roger was employed by Bankers Trust Company of New York where he worked on leveraged acquisitions. Roger serves on the Committee of 100 at Haverford College and as a Chair of the United Way of Massachusetts Bay Private Equity and Venture Capital Leadership Breakfast.

Roger earned and MBA degree with Honors from the Harvard Business School and received a BA degree, magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, in History from Haverford College.

Roger and his wife have two children. Their youngest has Down syndrome.

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Vincent Randazzo, Charlotte, North Carolina

Vincent Randazzo is a Senior Vice President and the Director of Government Relations for Wachovia Corporation, where h e is r esponsible for formulating and directing all activities relating to federal and state legislation and policies relating to the company and its lines of business. Prior to joining Wachovia, Vincent spent two years as the Director of Public Policy for the Business Roundtable, an association of chief executive officers of leading U.S. companies with a combined workforce of more than 10 million employees in the United States. Vincent also spent 17 years as a senior aide to Rep. David Dreier (R-CA). During that time, he was on the staff of the Committee on Rules in the U.S. House of Representatives, was the Committee’s chief of staff and the chairman’s senior floor expert and chief legislative strategist.

Vincent holds an MA in economics from George Mason University and a BS in political science from Eastern Michigan University.

Vincent and his wife have three children. One of their twins has Down syndrome.

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Patricia White, M.D.

Patricia is a graduate of the State University of New York, Downstate Medical Center. She completed her internship and residency in internal medicine at Hahnemann University Hospital, Pennsylvania. In 1985, she joined the Department of Internal Medicine at New York Medical College. She retired in 2001 as an Assistant Professor of Medicine. In addition to private practice, Patricia was actively involved in residency training. She served as Director of the outpatient medical clinic at Westchester County Medical Center and Director of the Medical Research Associates Headache Center. She was a clinical investigator for several pharmaceutical studies and served on numerous hospital and medical school committees. Prior to medical school, she worked as a laboratory technician in the Department of Molecular Cell Biology at The Rockefeller University, New York.

As the parents a son with Down syndrome, Patricia and her husband are actively involved with a variety of local and national organizations. Patricia is a member of the National Down Syndrome Society Research Coalition, a life-time member of the ARC of Essex County Candlelighters, and a Special Olympics Volunteer.

Patricia serves on the DSRTF's Research and Treatment Committee responsible for developing its Scientific Advisory Board.

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Andrew S. Miller, Philadelphia, PA

Andrew has been an attorney for 13 years, focusing on litigation arising from complex business disputes. Andrew practices with White and Williams LLP, a century-old law firm serving the mid-Atlantic region. Before attending law school, Andrew was a Foreign Service Officer with postings in Washington, D.C. and the American Embassy in Tel Aviv, Israel.

Andrew serves as a member of the American Bar Association’s Commission on Physical and Mental Disability Law. He is also a Hearing Committee Member serving the Disciplinary Board of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.

Andrew received a J.D, magna cum laude, from Georgetown University Law Center and a B.A. in History, cum laude, from Yale University.

Andrew and his wife have three children, one of whom was born with Down syndrome.

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Dr. Michael Harpold, Ph.D., Tucson, AZ

Dr. Michael Harpold has more than 30 years experience in biomedical research within both academia and the biotechnology industry. In 1999, Dr. Harpold established EnkephaSys, Inc. as a consultant on research, business, and intellectual property issues for pharmaceutical, diagnostics, and biotechnology companies. In addition, Dr. Harpold was a founding member of The Salk Institute Biotechnology/Industrial Associates, Inc. (SIBIA, subsequently SIBIA Neurosciences, Inc.) in La Jolla, CA. There he served as the company’s Vice President, Research through its IPO and prior to its acquisition by Merck. Subsequently, Dr. Harpold served as Chief Scientific Officer and as a Board member for The National Center for Genome Resources in Santa Fe, NM. Dr. Harpold also served as founding Chief Executive Officer of Integration Biosciences, Inc., an early stage biopharmaceutical company focused on novel infectious disease therapeutics.

A distinguished molecular and cellular biologist, Dr. Harpold received his Ph.D. in Molecular and Developmental Biology from Tulane University. Dr. Harpold was a Helen Hay Whitney Fellow at The Rockefeller University during postdoctoral research with Professor James Darnell. In addition, Dr. Harpold previously held a faculty appointment in the Department of Biochemistry, USC School of Medicine and was Member of the Norris/USC Comprehensive Cancer Center as well as a subsequent appointment with La Jolla Biological Laboratories of The Salk Institute. Dr. Harpold’s research has involved diverse problems in molecular biology, biotechnology, and biomedical science, including significant contributions to research in molecular signaling in the nervous system focused on receptors and voltage- and ligand-gated ion channels as well as drug discovery. Dr. Harpold is the author of numerous scientific publications and his work has led to 43 issued U.S. patents as well as an extensive set of foreign patents.

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Stephen M. Lazare, Pleasantville, NY

Stephen Lazare is a partner at the Manhattan law firm of Lazare Potter Giacovas & Kranjac LLP, where heads the firm’s insurance coverage/litigation group.  Steve is a 1985 graduate of Albany Law School of Union University, where he served as the Editor-in-Chief of its Law Review, and a 1982 graduate of St. Lawrence University where he earned a BA in Economics.  He is active in the New York State Bar Association, currently serving as Vice-Chairman of its Section on Insurance Coverage and is a frequent lecturer and author to the legal community.

Steve previously served on the board of Child Hope International and other non-profit organizations.  He was a member of the NDSS New York City Buddy Walk Steering Committee in 2004 and 2005. 

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Anthony Providenti, New York, NY

Anthony Providenti is Vice President - Corporate Business Development and Special Counsel at Henry Schein, Inc., a Fortune 500 healthcare company.  At Henry Schein, Anthony is responsible for mergers and acquisitions and other strategic transactions that drive growth and profitability.  Anthony previously served as a senior attorney in Henry Schein’s legal department. 

Prior to joining Henry Schein, Anthony was a senior corporate and transactional attorney with the New York office of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP, an international law firm. 
Anthony received a J.D. from Fordham University School of Law where he was a Notes and Articles Editor of the Fordham Law Review, and a B.S. from the College of Business and Economics at Lehigh University. 

Anthony and his wife, Jane, have three children including a son named Troy with Trisomy 21.  Their fundraising/awareness-raising team, Troy’s Boys and Girls, has benefited a number of Down syndrome-related causes.

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Jim Dovey, Denver, CO

Jim Dovey is an operating partner for the venture capital firm, Meritage Funds, based in Denver, Colorado.  The fund specializes in communications businesses and currently manages about $500M in capital. Jim was most recently the co-founding Chairman & CEO of Completel, a French Competitive Local Exchange Carrier (CLEC) headquartered in Paris, now a Meritage portfolio company.  After 17 years as an operating executive with United Cable Television Corp., Mr. Dovey founded and served as the Chairman & CEO of Telewest, the premier provider of bundled telephone and video services in the UK that successfully competed with British Telecom. Mr. Dovey currently serves on the Board of Trillion Partners, Inc., Cdigix Inc., and MCN, Inc., Meritage portfolio companies.  Mr. Dovey has been actively involved with several charities, including the Denver Down Syndrome Association and the Colorado Special Olympics. 

Jim and his wife Ellen have a 27 year old son named Brian with Down Syndrome.

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Jane Lodato, Portola Valley, CA

Jane Lodato is head of marketing for SVB Financial Group. She was hired to architect and implement a brand and identity strategy, create a marketing division, and oversee the strategic and creative execution of all phases of the company’s marketing communications, including branding and internal and external communications. Jane also oversees SVB Financial Group’s advertising, public relations, Web and events functions.

Prior to joining SVB Financial Group in 2002, Jane held positions as chief operating officer of Sierra Club Productions, senior vice president of marketing for Universal Studios Television, business development manager of special projects for Jay Chiat of Chiat/Day New York, and vice president of advertising for ABC Television Network where she managed the prime time advertising division for the network, launching several prime time shows, including Twin Peaks, Thirty Something, Home Improvement and Roseanne.
 
She began her marketing career at Nike when the company was still in its infancy, and was instrumental in the creation of Nike’s iconic sports celebrity posters.

Jane holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology from the University of Oregon.

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Sarah Wernikoff, Portola Valley, CA

Sarah Wernikoff has over 10 years experience in e-business management, online retail management, marketing and management consulting. Her experience launching and managing e-businesses ranges from a small start-up to a $100MM corporate business.

Most recently Sarah was responsible for the launch and general business management of the Pottery Barn Kids and PBteen ecommerce businesses as eCommerce Director at Williams-Sonoma, Inc.

Sarah received her MBA from George Washington University and her BA from Miami University of Ohio.