Spreading the word in Australia

Dr. Bonnie Sawatzky is one of the PIs at ICORD who studies the biomechanics and functional of wheeled mobility and also on the committee that plans the International Seating Symposium every other year in Vancouver. The symposium typically hosts about 800-900 attendees. More and more Australians are coming to the conference because they find they don’t have adequate access to information about seating and mobility.

Dr. Sawatzky has been invited to work with the SpineCare Fdn, and Australian New Zealand Spinal Cord Injury Network (ANZSCIN) to increase awareness and ways to build on existing knowledge and dissemination in this field. She will also be working with researchers in Melbourne to develop a collaborative project looking at the biomechanics of propulsion in children. In addition to developing research collaborations, she also wants to help establish a group based in Australia that will host an Australasian Seating Symposium in the future that will foster knowledge translation and increase the profile of mobility research in Australia.

Dr. Sawatzky carried the Paralympic Torch at UBC in March, 2010.

Dr. Sawatzky carried the Paralympic Torch at UBC in March, 2010. (Martin Dee photo)