Global Health News

Date: April 7, 2015
Time: 12:00pm
Location: Centre for Clinical Research, CH&E Classroom #409, 5790 University Avenue

Synopsis

The Wheelchair Skills Program (developed at Dalhousie University and Capital Health) includes evaluation and training tools to help practitioners translate research evidence into clinical practice. The Wheelchair Skills Test (WST) has been found to be safe, practical, reliable, valid and useful. In addition, a growing number of randomized controlled trials have shown the Wheelchair Skills Training Program (WSTP) to be an intervention that is safe, practical and effective at improving wheelchair skills capacity. The low-tech and high-impact nature of these tools has made them applicable in both developed and less-resourced settings around the world.

Biography
        
Dr Kirby received his MD degree from Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. His specialty training in Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation was carried out at the University of Washington in Seattle, Washington, USA, at Dalhousie University and at Stoke Mandeville Hospital in England. He is a Professor in the Division of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation in the Department of Medicine at Dalhousie University with cross-appointments in Kinesiology and Community Health and Epidemiology. He is based at the Nova Scotia Rehabilitation Centre Site of the Queen Elizabeth II Health Sciences Centre. His primary research interest is the safety and performance of wheelchairs. He has held research grants from a number of national and international funding bodies. He has published 143 papers in peer-reviewed journals and 302 abstracts or proceedings of presentations to national or international meetings. He heads the team that developed the Wheelchair Skills Program, a low-tech, high-impact training program that is relevant for both more- and less-resourced settings.