The College of Community Health Sciences is leading efforts to establish occupational and physical therapy degree programs at The University of Alabama.
The programs, a first for UA, represent an important expansion of the University’s health professions portfolio and align closely with the College’s mission to improve health outcomes across Alabama and the Southeast, particularly in rural and medically underserved communities.
The eight-semester doctoral programs will be housed within CCHS. The College has selected founding directors who will lead all aspects of development for their respective programs, including curriculum design, faculty recruitment, accreditation, clinical partnerships and operational infrastructure. The programs are slated to begin enrolling students within the next several years.
Dr. Elizabeth Barstow is director of the Occupational Therapy Program, and Dr. Robert Dale is director of the Physical Therapy Program.
“Their extensive experience leading innovative academic programs, building interdisciplinary partnerships and mentoring learners makes them well suited to guide these new programs from inception, through accreditation, to their launch and well into the future,” said Dr. Richard Friend, dean of CCHS.
“They are committed to developing programs that advance access to high-quality occupational and physical therapy care, particularly in rural and underserved communities across Alabama and the Southeast, and their leadership will be instrumental as CCHS continues to expand its academic portfolio and strengthen its role as a leader in community-focused health professions education.”
Prior to joining CCHS, Barstow was a professor of occupational therapy at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where she has served in multiple leadership capacities, including as director of the Low Vision Rehabilitation Graduate Certificate Program. The practice-oriented certificate degree program prepares occupational therapists to provide comprehensive intervention to adults with visual impairment from age-related eye diseases and brain injuries.
Additionally, Barstow played a central role in curriculum design, program assessment and accreditation, and provided leadership in the successful transition of UAB’s master’s-level occupational therapy program to a doctoral-level program.
Her clinical expertise and research focuses on functional vision, disability and participation, and community-based practice, with a particular emphasis on access to care and workforce development in rural settings.
Dale came to the College from his role as professor and chair of the Department of Physical Therapy for the College of Health Professions at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center in Memphis, where he was also director of the department’s Doctor of Physical Therapy Program.
Before joining UTHSC, Dale was professor and chair of the Department of Physical Therapy at the University of South Alabama in Mobile and served as director of the department’s Doctor of Physical Therapy Program.
Dale’s clinical expertise and research focuses on experimental sports-related and orthopedic areas of tendinopathy, rotator cuff fatigue, kinematics and kinetic analysis pertaining to the lumbar spine and thermoregulation
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