Susan L. Kapp, MEd, CPO, LPO

Susan L. Kapp, MEd, CPO, LPO, stepped on to the campus of Texas A&M University, College Station, in the mid 1970s, ready to experience not only the university lifestyle but American living as well. "It was a new world for me," she says. Kapp was born and raised in Stuttgart, Germany, to a German-born mother and an American father who served in the United States military and was stationed in Germany for nearly two decades. She attended Stuttgart (Ludswigsburg) American High School, a Department of Defense (DoD) school, and received what she calls an American education, but naturally "the environment and the lifestyle was very German for me growing up," she says. When she set off for college, on her own for the first time and headed to the United States for only the second time in her life, Kapp was about to be immersed in the world of prosthetics and orthotics and would soon embark on a wide-reaching career that has spanned nearly 30 years. Kapp is just as excited about the profession today as she was the day she first arrived on campus. Her interest in the prosthetics and orthotics profession started by chance, when she enrolled as a freshman at Texas A&M. One of many games of chance when entering college is landing the right roommate. Some will eat your food or commandeer the bathroom. Kapp's college roommate proved to be an inspiration. College Life Susan Kapp as a child in Germany. "I was in a pre-med curriculum, and I happened to room with a girl who had a [transtibial] congenital amputation. We ended up being roommates for three years," Kapp says. "I would watch her every morning, and she had a box of feet and a wrench. She would swap out her feet almost daily depending on what shoes she was wearing. This was in the 1970s, when we didn't have adjustable heel-height feet, so she would actually have to switch them out." Kapp said that she, like a number of pre-med majors, didn't end up going to medical school and probably never planned on it. She wanted a career that would allow her to focus on healthcare and medicine but one that also would include patient care. On top of that, she had always considered herself mechanically inclined. The final piece fell neatly into place during one fateful 200-mile road trip from campus to Houston, en route to one of the closest prosthetists available for her roommate. "My roommate needed an adjustment of some sort, and apparently she didn't go to her prosthetist very often. I only recall her going to Houston once in the three years that we were together," Kapp says. "We drove to Muilenburg Prosthetics [& Orthotics], which was my first introduction into a prosthetic and orthotic clinic. I just found it fascinating. I thought, 'I need to look at this a little more closely"' Down the Career Path Kapp, an associate professor, has held the position of director of the Prosthetics-Orthotics Program at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas (UT Southwestern) since 1986, and she is one of the founding members of the National Commission on Orthotic and Prosthetic Education (NCOPE). However, those are but two of her many responsibilities and titles. Kapp juggles a schedule that includes classroom time, patient care, resident education, and administration. She maintains the university's prosthetic curriculum in electronic form and posts the materials for student use at the beginning of each semester with updates throughout. She also establishes prosthetic course schedules and syllabi. For someone who didn't necessarily hear a calling in education while still a student herself, Kapp has certainly immersed herself in the fabric of UT Southwestern. "I'm surprised I ended up in education, actually," she says. "My plan was to do patient care-fortunately I do both." After earning a bachelor's degree in 1979, Kapp immediately enrolled in the long-term certificate program in prosthetics at Northwestern University, Chicago, Illinois. She landed a residency at Corpus Christi Prosthetics and dove directly into her career. Her first official position was at the Dallas Rehabilitation Institute as a prosthetist. She earned prosthetic certification from the American Board for Certification in Orthotics, Prosthetics & Pedorthics (ABC) in 1982. "I did not go to prosthetic school and decide that I was going to move into the university environment," she says. "I ended up here in Dallas after the residency and worked for Mel Stills, CO(E), HFISPO. There was no program here [at the university], and they wanted to start one and were looking for faculty. [Stills] convinced me to consider a faculty position." Kapp and a prosthetic resident work with patients at UT Southwestern. Photographs courtesy of Susan Kapp. Stills was an instrumental force behind the founding of the prosthetics-orthotics program at UT Southwestern. He also helped guide Kapp toward work at the university. "I hired Susan to work with me at Dallas Rehab, and she ran off to the school and left me" Stills jokes. "She is a great person and has done a wonderful job developing the O&P school there in Dallas." William Carlton, CO, a fellow instructor in UT Southwestern's P&O program watched as Kapp thrived. "Susan started in O&P doing technician work at a facility in Corpus Christi before she went to Northwestern...and has not looked back," Carlton says. "She's been involved in every major academic advance in our field since and has authored chapters, articles, chaired professional committees, etc." While Kapp's knowledge and experience covers both prosthetics and orthotics, her initial focus was and remains prosthetics. "I went to school for prosthetics first, as P&O seemed to be two fairly separate tracks at the time." As Kapp continued her studies, as she does to this day, she eventually completed an orthotic certificate in 1990. "I thought it was important for me to learn the other half of our profession" she says. "Looking back I think, 'Gosh, this has made me a much better prosthetist.' Even if I don't practice orthotics day to day, it makes me a stronger prosthetist." But CPO, LPO, and MEd are just a handful of letters and don't come close to describing all that Kapp does for the profession. "That woman is crazy.... She is just a house on fire" says Darrell R. Clark, CO, director of the Orthotic Department at Rancho Los Amigos National Rehabilitation Center, Downey, California. Although Clark refers to his friend of 20-some years as "crazy" in the best possible way, he is hardly kidding. "She is one of my favorite people, and she is just tireless in her efforts. And her program at the university is one of the best in the country because of it." NCOPE Executive Director Robin Seabrook, one of the organization's founding members along with Kapp, explains why her longtime friend and fellow professional chooses to live her job for 11 months a year (she tends to take most of June off for a family vacation). "She really cares for and loves the profession," Seabrook says. "She has dedicated a lot of time and energy for the betterment of prosthetics, and for herself and her own education, too. She is a very busy person, not only as an educator heading up the UT program but also at the clinical patient care facility.. She wants the profession to grow and go as far as it can go." Kapp is a member of the International Society for Prosthetics and Orthotics (ISPO), the American Academy of Orthotists and Prosthetists (the Academy) the Texas Chapter of the Academy, and the National Association of Prosthetic-Orthotic Educators (NAPOE). She holds a number of senior positions at NCOPE and is on the executive board of the Texas Chapter of the Academy, a ten-year commitment that expires this year. "It's funny that I'm going to finally, after ten years, rotate off. I remember when I signed on thinking, 'This is a ten-year commitment.' My daughter was five at the time, and I couldn't quite picture her being a teenager by the time I finished," says Kapp. "But it feels like I just started." She is a member of ISPO's e-Learning working group, a reviewer for a number of O&P publications, and a member of the Academy Awareness Committee. She says about half of her time is spent with patients, and she teaches P&O students or medical residents one or two days each week. "She is pretty enthusiastic about the program," says Monica Schmeider, a second-year student in the UT Southwestern prosthetics program. Kapp is a member of no less than five university committees. Class Is Never Over Kapp discusses prosthetic options with a patient. Continuing education is a necessity for all practitioners, and Kapp is as up to date as anyone. In 2007 she took the C-LegÂ® advanced course; the Marlo Ortiz Socket design course; the WalkAideÂ® functional electrical stimulation (FES) training course; Ossur's Rheo KneeÂ® certification course; and attended a Care of Combat Amputee Conference. Kapp has studied legal issues, cranial remolding orthoses, L-Coding seminars, scoliosis screening, and countless other product courses. "I have to be flexible with my schedule to be able to juggle everything," Kapp says. "I work with great people-six faculty, two residents, and support staff. I generally have one prosthetic resident who I work most closely with, and without all that support I would be hard-pressed to do what I do." The work is never done, and Kapp and the staff at UT Southwestern are focused on preparing the university for a master's program curriculum by 2010, as recently mandated by NCOPE. Summer Getaway During the one month out of the year when Kapp isn't "living her job," Kapp, her husband Phil, and their 15-year-old daughter pursue another passion-travel. School is out (though Kapp is quick to mention that her summer break is not much longer than three weeks as students are on campus year round), and the family often hits the road for epic road trips across the United States. Past trips have covered Civil War territory and the Pacific Coast Highway, but this year's destination is Italy. Just like her first adventure to college in a familiar but foreign country, Kapp never stops exploring. Brady Delander can be reached at 303.255.0843 or linkEmail('brady','opedge.com'); .

Susan L. Kapp, MEd, CPO, LPO

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Susan L. Kapp, MEd, CPO, LPO

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