Month: October 2019

Jeff Woods Named First Mottier Family Professor

Nov. 06, 2019 | Anna Flanagan

The professorship was made possible through an estate gift of Charles and Audrey Phyllis Mottier

AHS Dean Cheryl Hanley-Maxwell congratulates Dr. Jeff Woods on becoming the first Mottier Family Professor

Dr. Jeff Woods, internationally renowned scholar in the area of exercise physiology, was named the first Mottier Family Professor of Applied Health Sciences in an investiture ceremony in the Alice Campbell Alumni Center on October 28.

Dr. Woods is a professor in the Department of Kinesiology and Community Health, Director of the Center on Health, Aging, and Disability, and Associate Dean for Research in the College of Applied Health Sciences. His research focuses on the effects of exercise on the immune system, the gut microbiome, and aging. He was among the first scholars to demonstrate that regular exercise can have an anti-inflammatory effect on the body and showed that exercise can improve the response to the flu vaccine in adults. He was the first to show that exercise, independent of diet, can affect the gut microbiome.

The author of more than 130 peer-reviewed scientific journal articles, Dr. Woods is a Fellow of the National Academy of Kinesiology and the American College of Sports Medicine. He completed his Ph.D. in Exercise Science at the University of South Carolina.

Among the many people he thanked in accepting his professorship were his AHS colleagues, who, he said, “…guide and challenge me and make this an inspiring place to work.”

The professorship was made possible through an estate gift of Charles and Audrey Phyllis Mottier, both of whom graduated from the University of Illinois. She completed her undergraduate degree in Physical Education for Women and had a lifelong interest in links between exercise, movement, and health. Sons Chip and Brad Mottier said they were excited to see their mother’s wish fulfilled.

“She believed participation was the height of enjoyment,” Chip said. Audrey Phyllis and Charles both lived life to the fullest, Brad added, and believed in making each day a little above average.
 

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AHS celebrates outstanding alumni

Oct. 18, 2019 | Anna Flanagan

AHS Distinguished Alumni Award recipient John Consalvi and Dr. Patricia Barrett Malik, who received the 2019 Harold Scharper Award, shared advice from their academic and professional journies with student leaders during a luncheon on Oct. 18 (Photo by Jerry Thompson)

A bilingual speech-language pathologist who has helped train and place bilingual clinicians throughout the United States and a woman who began her career at Illinois as a graduate student and ended it as the director of the Division of Disability Resources and Educational Services were honored for their achievements during a ceremony on October 18.

In accepting the 2019 Distinguished Alumni Award from the College of Applied Health Sciences, John Consalvi said, “The best thing about receiving an honor like this is feeling that you are part of something special, something greater than yourself. What a tremendous gift.”

John completed his master’s degree in Speech-Language Pathology in 1991. He became a bilingual clinician in the Chicago Public Schools system, an enormous system with thousands of students who were native Spanish speakers and only six bilingual speech-language pathologists. He founded Bilingual Therapies Inc. to train bilingual clinicians and place them in schools, growing the company into a nationwide staffing provider in 10 years. He recently launched SPEDXchange, an online resource that facilitates connections among those in the special education community, including special education teachers, speech- language pathologists, occupational therapists, school psychologists, school district administrators, and all staff that serve special education students and their families.

John received the 2018 Louis M. DiCarlo Award for Recent Clinical Achievement from the American Speech-Language-Hearing Foundation. He is a Fellow of the Illinois Speech-Language-Hearing Association, which awarded him Honors of the Association in 2017.

Dr. Patricia Barrett Malik received the 2019 Harold Scharper Award from the Division of Disability Resources and Educational Services. Pat completed a master’s degree (1982) and Ph.D. (1988) in what is now the Department of Recreation, Sport and Tourism, focusing on therapeutic recreation. Her graduate assistantship was with DRES, then under the direction of its founder Tim Nugent.

Pat held a tenured position at Illinois State University until 1998, when she resigned to help her husband Ron Malik grow a community rehabilitation business that changed the model for group homes. In 2005, she returned to the University of Illinois as director of the Beckwith residential program within DRES and assumed the leadership of DRES in 2014. Pat oversaw many efforts to advance accessibility and inclusivity at Illinois, including the development of a wireless remote control that makes campus elevators more user-friendly for students with severe physical disabilities and an innovation technology project with the Toyota Foundation that made it to the top 10 international entries.

Among the things she learned at Illinois, she told the audience at the event, was that making mistakes is part of living life. “The greatest mistake one can make in life is to be afraid of making mistakes,” she said.

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AHS to launch first-of-its-kind degree

Dec. 12, 2019 | Anna Flanagan

Wendy Rogers, left, and Nicole Holtzclaw-Stone were on hand Dec. 10 as the Illinois Board of Higher Education approved the new Master of Science in Health Technology program. (Photo provided)

Following the approval this week of the Illinois Board of Higher Education, AHS will welcome its first cohort of students into the new Master of Science in Health Technology (MS-HT) degree program in the fall of 2020.

The degree, designed to advance applied health technology design and implementation, resulted from an “Investment for Growth” proposal submitted to the campus by AHS and the Grainger College of Engineering. It fills a void in the development of a workforce in the increasingly important areas of health technology and human factors, which addresses such issues as ergonomics, product design, and human-computer interaction.

Dr. Wendy Rogers, Khan Professor of Applied Health Sciences, will serve as director of the Health Technology Education Program. Dr. Nicole Holtzclaw-Stone will serve as Assistant Director.

At the first meeting of the MS-HT advisory board, Dr. Rogers shared findings of comprehensive research conducted by Illinois Business Consulting (IBC) and a survey she and Dr. Holtzclaw-Stone developed to assess the need and interest for such a program.

“Through surveys, focus groups, and cold calls to industry, IBC found that there are no existing master’s programs in health technology, either within the United States or internationally,” Dr. Rogers said. “Moreover, interest in this degree is high at both the undergraduate and graduate levels.  In our survey of 65 industry experts in health technology, 92 percent said the degree would be valuable.” That same survey revealed that 65 percent of respondents thought it was likely that their organization would be interested in hiring the program’s graduates. One industry respondent summed it up by saying, “There is a dire need for this unique program in the healthcare industry.”

While housed in the Department of Kinesiology and Community Health, the MS-HT is a collaborative effort with the Grainger College of Engineering, primarily the Department of Industrial and Enterprise Systems Engineering. Other collaborating departments in engineering include Mechanical Engineering, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Bioengineering, and Computer Science, as well as the Departments of Speech and Hearing Science and Recreation, Sport and Tourism in AHS.

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Rogers, Mudar receive $4.6M grant to establish center focused on older adults with cognitive impairment

June 27, 2024 | Vince Lara-Cinisomo

The funding is for a Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center entitled ENHANCE (Enhancing Neurocognitive Health, Abilities, Networks, and Community Engagement)

The University of Illinois is part of a team receiving a $4.6 million grant aimed at helping adults with cognitive disabilties deal with challenges associated with everyday activities.

The grant from the National Institute on Disability, Independent Living, and Rehabilitation Research runs from Sept. 30, 2019 to Sept. 29, 2024 and is a collaborative effort with Weill Cornell Medicine and Florida State University, with Illinois’ share amounting to approximately $1.4 million.

Kinesiology and Community Health professor Wendy Rogers and Speech and Hearing Science associate professor Raksha Mudar are the principle investigators on the research for Illinois. Harshal Mahajan, assistant research professor of Kinesiology and Community Health, is also an investigator on the project.

The funding is for a Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center entitled ENHANCE (Enhancing Neurocognitive Health, Abilities, Networks, and Community Engagement).

Rogers and Mudar said the primary research aims are to understand challenges adults with cognitive disability deal with every day, and to identify existing and emerging technology that can help. Three segments of the population are part of the study group: Adults 60 and older with mild cognitive impairment, cognitive impairments due to stroke and those who have sustained a traumatic brain injury.

“What we’re trying to do is understand the challenges that they experience in their daily activities,” Rogers said. “In one study, we’ll be interviewing them about what they do outside the home, what they do around the home; shopping, transportation, health, finances and then just basic daily activities, such as mobility and medication regimen.”

Rogers said the study’s participants will include both the the individuals with cognitive disability as well as their family members who provide support and care. They will be exploring whether needs change over time, with interviews repeated across the five-year project.

“Really, we’re trying to get an understanding in general of people with cognitive disability on an everyday basis, what kind of challenges are they experiencing and how might we design technology to support that.”

Another goal is understanding what this population uses in terms of current technology to mitigate their impairments.

One of the projects, Rogers said, involves helping adults with cognitive disability use Google Maps and rideshare apps, through additional instructions and support, which could include an app on their phone that walks them through steps, or a video that illustrates what to do and helps them as they learn.

Mudar explained that they also plan to engage healthcare providers and the technology industry in hopes of developing partnerships.

Editor’s note:

To reach Vince Lara-Cinisomo, email vinlara@illinois.edu.
 

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