Programs in Physical Therapy and Rehabilitation Science At Drexel University May 2007 News Letter

Graduation News
Congratulations to our 2007 graduating Professional and Post-Professional DPT students and MHS student. We are proud to welcome our new DPTs among our colleagues! Professional DPT graduates who earned special program awards were Megan Henninger, Christopher McKenzie, Amanda Rosage, Mary Ellen Mahoney, and Wendy Novick. Our nominee for Alpha Eta (National Allied Health Professions Honor Society) was Amanda Rosage, and our Who’s Who nominations were Megan Henninger, Christopher McKenzie, Mary Ellen Mahoney and Wendy Novick.

In addition, we congratulate our MHS graduate, Karen Larson, OTR/L, who received a Clinical Leadership and Impact on Practice Award and our nomination for Alpha Eta.

Graduates of our Post-Professional DPT who received special program recognition were Janey Farber, who received the Evelyn B. Noyovitz Award and Marcie Kaminker, who received a Clinical Leadership Practice Award. Marcie was also our nominee for Alpha Eta. Our nominations for Who’s Who were Terry Andrus, Janey Farber and Kristin Loock. Again, congratulations to all!

Student News
Spearheaded by Professional DPT students in the class of 2008, students in the classes of 2008 and 2009 conducted a number of fundraising events that resulted in a $700.00 donation to the Foundation for Physical Therapy via the Pittsburgh-Marquette Challenge. As community service, faculty and students staffed a booth promoting fitness at Drexel’s “Celebrate Health Fair” in west Philadelphia.

Rupal Patel, MSPT, PhD student in Rehab Sciences and his mentors, Drs. Susan Smith and Sheri Silfies presented a research project, “Postural Response of Trunk Muscles in Patients with Chronic Mechanical Low Back Pain” at CSM.

Anand Bhattacharya, PT, Scott Biely, PT, DPT, OCS, Ali El-Kerdi, DPT, MS, ATC, Jeegisha Kapila, PT and Rupal Mehta, MSPT, post-professional graduate students, and their mentors, Drs. Smith and Silfies, presented research at the North East American Society of Biomechanics conference in College Park, MD.

Faculty News
Sheri Silfies, PT, PhD, Assistant Professor, was awarded a Mentored Research Scientist Development Award from the National Institutes of Health for her project entitled, Recurrent Low Back Pain: Linking Mechanisms to Outcomes.

Drs. David Ebaugh, Maria Benedetto, and Kevin Gard were all recently promoted to Clinical Associate Professors.