2023 Archives

DPT faculty Dr. Kathy Lee Bishop received the Katherine Harris Educator Award from the American Physical Therapy Association's Academy of Acute Care. The award honors individuals who have made substantial contributions in the area of acute care physical therapy education. Dr. Bishop generously shares her extensive knowledge of physical therapist acute care practice with DPT students, Acute Care PT residents and a host of other healthcare students and professionals. Dr. Bishop serves as the director of Emory’s PT Acute Care residency program, co-editor of Acute Care Physical Therapy: A Clinician’s Guide, currently in its second edition and works with the CDC to improve patient access to cardiac rehabilitation.  

DPT faculty Dr. Michael Borich, received the 2023 American Physical Therapy Association Eugene Michels New Investigator Award. The award recognizes physical therapists who have engaged in independent or collaborative research efforts within 10 years of completing their most recent physical therapy professional degree, post-professional doctoral degree (other than a transition DPT degree) or post-professional doctoral fellowship. Dr. Borich is the principal investigator in the Neural Plasticity Research Laboratory. The lab utilizes cutting-edge neuroimaging and neurostimulation techniques to study the structure and function of the nervous system in healthy individuals and people with conditions affecting the nervous system. Current research projects include Neural Correlates of Whole-Body Motion Perception, Neurophysiologic Assessment of Proprioceptive Deficit and Altered Visuo-Proprioceptive Processing Post- Stroke and others. 

2023 APTA Honors and Awards

DPT faculty Dr. Marie Johanson was selected to be a Catherine Worthingham Fellow of the American Physical Therapy Association (APTA). This honor is given to APTA physical therapist members or life member physical therapists who have demonstrated unwavering efforts to advance the physical therapy profession for more than 15 years. The FAPTA designation is the highest honor among APTA's membership categories.

2023 APTA Honors and Awards

Read the Fall 2023 issue of Journal of Humanities in Rehabilitation.

Graduating and transitioning to practice can be an exciting and stressful time for many. On this episode, Danielle Audain, SPT, member of the APTA Student Board of Directors, asks four PTs to share their advice for new grads and what they wished they had known when they graduated. They discuss everything from negotiating your first job offer to avoiding burnout. Listen to the podcast.

Emory University Division of Physical Therapy, Department of Rehabilitation Medicine serves as a clinical research site to study Vagus Nerve Stimulation.

Stimulation of the vagus nerve directly within the neck to improve impaired upper limb function among stroke survivors has a distinguished history of demonstrated value first in animal models and now in patients. Vagus means “wander” and the tenth cranial or vagus nerve does just that. Most clinicians recognize the vagus as a primary nerve providing parasympathetic innervation to our viscera. But some of its upstream or sensory input expands throughout much of the brain.

Microtransponder, Inc., responsible for funding most of the clinical studies using Vagus Nerve Stimulation (VNS), has received a prestigious award for its development and application. Fundamentally, the procedure involves pairing VNS with initiation of a functional task in treating stroke patients with upper extremity impairment. The “pivotal” study was a multicenter, double-blinded, randomized controlled trial which enrolled 108 subjects who were up to 10 years post-stroke and demonstrated moderate to severe upper extremity impairment. Both the patient and clinician did not know (are blinded) if the stimulation paired with the movement was real or sham. The results of this work undertaken at 19 sites in the United States and United Kingdom have provided unequivocal results demonstrated the pairing yields significantly more improvement than the training itself. Moreover, when the patients receiving the sham stimulation were switched over to the paired stimulation mode, they show the same improvements as the group who had originally received this paired combination. The use of vagus nerve stimulation for post-stroke upper extremity rehabilitation has been approved by the FDA.

The Division of Physical Therapy, Department of Rehabilitation Medicine participated as one of the 19 sites. Steven Wolf, PT, PhD, served as the Emory site Principal Investigator. The outcome of this study appeared in the prestigious journal, Lancet (2021, 397:1545-1553).  For a demonstration and story about this work and other research being undertaken by our faculty, please visit the piece that appeared on Your Fantastic Mind.

Press Release Reference

Division of Physical Therapy Associate Professor Dr. Beth Davis is to be recognized on Emory School of Medicine Educator Appreciation Day, May 24, 2023. Dr. Davis will be recognized for her outstanding contributions to learner education. She coordinates and teaches the Health Services and Management, Professional Leadership and Development, Administration, and Consultation in Healthcare, Interprofessional Education and Collaborative Practice I and II and Business Management for the Physical Therapist Entrepreneur courses. Her research focuses on interprofessional education and collaborative practice for facilitators and students with an interest in faculty and clinical instructor development. The School of Medicine Recognitions Committee reviews faculty members nominated by their peers as educators who exemplified the outstanding faculty of the Emory School of Medicine.

The John W. Goldschmidt Award is given to an individual who reflects the attributes of Dr. John W. Goldschmidt in terms of voluntary and tireless efforts, enhancement of interdisciplinary multi-specialty team development and approach to patient care, the advancement of facility to care for individuals with physical disabilities, as well as intellectual, emotional and academic commitment to the precepts and the intimate intricacies of rehabilitation as a specialty field. With this award, Dr. Wolf joins a distinguished list of physicians who have made invaluable contributions to the field of rehabilitation medicine. He will deliver the lecture on Friday, June 16th, 2023, from 12:00-1:00pm at the MedStar National Rehabilitation Hospital Auditorium in Washington, DC.