Design Your Own PhD Program

Since there are no doctoral O&P programs designed for clinicians interested in advancing their education and future prospects, the necessary challenge of designing one’s own program can be both intimidating and empowering. Identifying your area of O&P focus may be easy, but locating other departments, disciplines, or areas of study in which PhDs are awarded, and identifying one within which you can work to advance your knowledge through core courses and electives that are relevant to your research or other objectives may not be simple. (For successful examples of unique programs tailored to the interests and needs of their designers, read “O&P PhDs Share Their Stories.” ) Gerald Stark, PhD, MSEM, CPO/L, FAAOP(D), director of clinical operations and technical support, BionIT Labs, and adjunct instructor, University of Tennessee, Chattanooga (UTC), leveraged his master’s degree in engineering management into a PhD in organizational learning and leadership that works seamlessly with managing projects and contributing to leadership of organizational groups within O&P as well. Core and elective courses in curriculum design, innovation adoption, and instructional design were available through the UTC Education Department, which ultimately conferred/awarded the doctoral degree. “This program offered flexibility that worked for me,” Stark recalls. “What I looked at was adoption of innovation, which could be applied to adoption or rejection of a prosthesis. It allowed me to think a little more critically of how systems work together or don’t work.” Some of the interests that culminate in your dissertation are determined during your core courses, he points out. “Your dissertation writing is formulated while you’re doing the core courses, and you are refining your interests in each class. This really determines what you’re going to write about. Normally you take a preparatory class for your dissertation and that’s when you get hooked in with everything as well as the process.” More and more schools are now offering doctoral programs, and a large variety are in the healthcare area, he observes. “Some are technical, like biomechanics or applied physiology, and may be harder to get into once you have started your career as a clinician. But you can find many healthcare-related programs that are more management based, or education based, and are continuing to expand. “Accessibility of your program, classes, and advisor, is one thing to consider; life will be easier if you can meet your committee chair in the town you live in to facilitate the communication.” Sally A. Kenworthy, PhD, CPO, assistant professor, Baylor College of Medicine Orthotics & Prosthetics, initially considered getting her PhD in education, but wound up focusing on kinesiology and biomechanics instead. “I was actually looking for skills that were more transferrable and more universal outside of education, so I could keep my options open to do research anywhere—within or outside of education. I’m also really passionate about kinesiology and biomechanics, and the skills I got there are transferrable to all kinds of different industries and job titles. That was really important to me. “I think it’s more important to pursue a PhD in something that is going to grow your skill set, not necessarily just refine the same one. I didn’t necessarily want a PhD in O&P research. I wanted to see how biomechanists are doing research and then bring my perspective to that and change it accordingly.” She suggests exploring other options on which to focus your PhD, depending on your interests. “Some pathways may lead you into rehab sciences, kinesiology, biomechanics; or you can get your PhD in engineering. Often this can depend on your advisor, because some advisors don’t allow you to push your own research agenda. They really expect you to work with them so you can learn their research agenda. A lot rides on the advisor in terms of what that experience, and even what the content focus is going to be.” Samantha Stauffer, CPO, MSOP, FAAOP, director of research, Independence Prosthetics-Orthotics, Delaware, and a doctoral candidate at the University of Delaware in the Delaware Limb Loss Studies Lab, is earning her PhD in biomechanics and movement science. “Biomechanics is not the only pathway, but it seems to be the most common type of program for someone who is in O&P that wants to get their PhD. There are a lot of biomechanics programs and there are more than two dozen research labs that are doing research directly related to prosthetic and orthotic care in the United States, but other pathways could be programs like rehabilitation medicine or health sciences,” she suggests. The American Physical Therapy Association has a list of doctoral programs that are suitable for physical therapists but offer crossover opportunities, she notes. “The list includes a lot of the health sciences and rehabilitation medicine PhDs. The American Society of Biomechanics also has a state-by-state list of all the biomechanics research labs in the United States. “What I would recommend instead, though, is to look at research that’s recently been published in your area of interest. Look at who the researchers are—what groups published it, and what program they teach in. When you’re looking for a PhD, the school that you go to isn’t necessarily as important as who your advisor is and the work that you’ll be doing.” Shane Wurdeman, PhD, chief clinical officer, Hanger Clinic, Texas, approves of the different and varied pathways to a doctoral degree with an O&P focus. “I actually think that the entire industry or field advances and benefits more from individuals that are pursuing different areas of study. When someone who’s been practicing as a clinician then studies psychology or health economics or physical activity, all of a sudden these individuals are going to bring that knowledge base into our industry or field. By bringing that to our meetings and presenting to and teaching to our colleagues, our whole industry and field is elevated. It prompts us to think about different things in terms of what we’re doing for our patients, things that otherwise might not be considered because they’re not part of our base O&P education.” Those areas available for study are limited only by one’s recognition of a unique connective benefit and the opportunity to explore its relevance in improving O&P patient care. “As a PhD, you might find yourself, in a laboratory setting in a field of study that hadn’t really been brought into O&P at all—not because there isn’t value, but because no one has really thought of how it creates a better patient care experience. That individual might be the pioneer that ultimately introduces that new aspect, and subsequently the whole field and industry is able to advance because that pioneer is focusing on something that no one else has ever thought to bring into our field.” Judith Philipps Otto is a freelance writer who has assisted with marketing and public relations for various clients in the O&P profession. She has been a newspaper writer and editor and has won national and international awards as a broadcast writer-producer.

Design Your Own PhD Program

Insights, Advice, and Cautions for O&P PhD Seekers

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Insights, Advice, and Cautions for O&P PhD Seekers

Fillauer TRS Moves Operations

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O&P Technician II – Portland, Oregon

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