Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD

Peds neurogeneticist/scientist @wakehealth interested in mito DNA depletion syndromes. Mom to a neurotypical firecracker and an autistic 🦖 lover. Views=mine.

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

How it started -> How it’s going

From @TheACMG trainee reception to being co-presenters in 2 years, I’m so glad to have @zwhitt29 with me on this early career journey! Here’s to more conferences and more presentations together in the future!

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

Phenomenal keynote at #ICIEM2025 - terrific story of some of the most important discoveries in mitochondrial biology to date, including the unique rotational mechanism of ATP Synthase.

[Kuntal Sen MD @kuntal_sen_]

🎉 #CNSAM registration is OPEN!
🧬 Join us for the 1st ever Genetics Summit
📅 Last day of meeting—SO worth it!
🎯 Hands-on, practical, not esoteric
👩‍⚕️ Designed for peds neuro trainees & clinicians
🙌 Incredible educators lined up!
🔗 Don’t forget to register & save your seat!

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

Due to multiple aircraft issues on both legs of this @AirCanada trip, we’ve had a 6+ hour wait in one airport and are in the middle of a 5+ hour wait in the 2nd. In all, we will have a 21 hour travel day for 5 hours of flight time. So glad this acct could return to its roots.

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

Fun fact: I created this acct specifically to hound @AirCanada into giving me the refund they announced me they owed passengers after ~12 mos of refusing to refund ticket costs for COVID-canceled flights in 2020.

This trip is an 4-years-delayed replacement of that trip.

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

We had a great experience with @TSA Cares at @CLTAirport this morning. We have been super nervous preparing for the dude’s first plane ride - and while the day may be hard still because we have yet to do the *plane* part - we were SO grateful for assistance through security.

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

I am so grateful that we are now recognizing the importance and value of autistic play, because I would be super bummed if I never got to see an all-dinosaur reenactment of the movie Sing.

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

I didn’t get the grant, but I passed both boards, and although he demures, @zwhitt29 played a significant role in that pass.

What I am saying is - get you friends that support you in all your absurdity, and never let them go.

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

This week, I have been dropping the kids off at summer camp. This reminds me of doing the same last summer, often during which @zwhitt29 was on a hands-free phone call reading me board questions because that was the most efficient study tactic when I was otherwise grant writing.

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

@MariyaSweetwyne As far as I have seen, disability advocates prefer “disabled people” - some may prefer people first with “people who are disabled” and many feel that “differently abled” is an obfuscation that undersells the challenges that are then compounded by an unaccommodating society.

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

@RenegadeSynapse @zach_london @coffinmed @GreenJournal @AANmember @EricaSchuyler @ChrisLeeNeuro @BlakeBuletko @EYemmCoon @RJNeuromuscular @drpearcekorb @DrJeffRatliff @yaleneuropd @AMahajanMD @NMatch2025 I don’t know, the 20 patients with hand, foot and mouth that I saw when I left my 29 day old to return to work were extremely educational.

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

Extremely niche piece of advice - if your autistic non-speaking son suddenly becomes very interested in a snippet of “Unwritten” at bedtime on his 6th birthday, you should only play him the whole song if you want to cry like a character in an early 2000s coming of age film.

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

@C_Kittock @usd Congratulations! We were a LEND mentor family, and we really enjoyed getting to show our trainee a bit about family life with an autistic kid. Including my son’s ABA therapy program’s carnival, during which he *very* quickly stole & yeeted a (rubber, thankfully) skeeball…

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

@TakeThatNurses @JustineLeves01 When I was in my adult neurology year of training, I had a family meeting for a 70+ year old patient that included their mother. It cemented what I knew from my peds years - no matter how many years a mother has spent with the child she is losing, it is never enough.

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

@JustineLeves01 I’m a pediatric neurogeneticist, and I always say that my favorite appointments are the ones where I get to laugh and cry with my patients. Even better if I have a trainee or student with me! I hope I never stop being moved by those moments with families.

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

Grateful that I was given the opportunity to present my most vexing metabolic quandary as part of the Unknown/Challenging Cases session! Being able to tap into the collective expertise and wisdom of the @SIMDtweets group was a privilege!

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

Enjoyed presenting my poster on the first patient I diagnosed after starting my faculty job! We should reconsider historic metabolic diagnoses and offer molecular testing for adult patients whose clinical courses deviate from what is expected for their diagnosis!

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

@Stanford_Neuro @RebeccaJLevyMD @StanfordMed @StanfordChild Congratulations, @RebeccaJLevyMD! I’ve been waiting to see this news!!

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

PDCD can present as structural brain anomalies including corpus callosum dysgenesis; since this is a known presentation of multiple treatable disorders, @NeuroMetabolism has convinced me that prenatal WES/WGS is the best fetal genetic evaluation for congenital brain anomalies!

[Jenny Harmon, MD, PhD @md_harmon]

It is difficult to describe how amazing it is to be able to look up at the sun and see the stars right beside it! Levi didn’t understand the point of the glasses, but he was able to appreciate Totality!