May 30, 2023 – Scott Crawford, PhD, an assistant professor in the University of Wisconsin Departments of Kinesiology at the School of Education and Orthopedics and Rehabilitation at the School of Medicine and Public Health, was recently awarded a KL2 Scholar Program grant; he will officially begin the program in July 2023. Funded by the NIH through the UW Institute for Clinical and Translational Research (ICTR), the KL2 Scholar Program supports “junior faculty at UW Madison pursuing and actively engaged in translational research and who are committed to developing an independent research program.” Crawford’s KL2 grant will provide him with two years of protected time for research and career development training – allowing him to delve into novel ideas and emerge as a leader in the field.

His current research project, “Neuroplasticity in Muscle Mechanics Following Hamstring Injury: A Combined fMRI and Ultrasound Study,” will investigate the neural changes that occur after hamstring injuries. Crawford says that, while we have gotten good at diagnosing and identifying the progression of hamstring injuries and returning athletes to their sport, “re-injury rates are still very high.” Most studies show as high as 1 in 3 will go on to re-injure – though some show re-injuries as high as 60% or more.

By examining muscle tissue mechanics using ultrasound and brain activity using fMRI, Crawford hopes to uncover if altered brain activity following a recent hamstring strain injury may be related to why re-injury rates for hamstring strains remain high, despite advancements in rehabilitation protocols. The study is still in the piloting stage, where Dr. Crawford and his team are refining their methodology before enrolling participants.

Before coming to UW, Dr. Crawford earned his Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering from Cedarville University in Ohio and his Master’s and PhD in Biomedical Engineering from The Ohio State University. He joined the UW as an NIH-funded TL1 Post-Doctoral Trainee under Dr. Bryan Heiderscheit in January 2019 – later transitioning to a faculty position in the Kinesiology Department with a joint appointment in the Department of Orthopedics and Rehabilitation in August 2022.

Dr. Crawford’s educational background in biomedical engineering and biomechanics and his work in the Badger Athletics Performance Lab shaped his interdisciplinary approach to studying sport-related muscle injury. Further, as Dr. Crawford pursues the focused study afforded by his KL2 grant, he says that the symbiotic relationship between research investigators across different academic departments, clinicians, and surgeons at UW allows him to “collaborate with people like Dr. Heiderscheit, [the Badger Athletics Performance Program], and other orthopedic faculty members” and find “common ground” that will ultimately translate research findings into impactful treatments for patients.
 

Stephanie Kliethermes, PhD, was recently awarded an R13 Grant from the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities to support an all-day Research Summit on health disparities in sports medicine. Dr. Kliethermes is is an Associate Professor in the UW Department of Orthopedics and Rehabilitation and currently serves as Research Director of the American Medical Society for Sports Medicine (AMSSM). She organized this event through the AMSSM.

Held on April 28, 2023, the Research Summit kicked off the AMSSM Annual Meeting in Phoenix, Arizona. The Summit focused on:

• Identifying current knowledge gaps regarding the impact of health disparities in sports and exercise medicine and establishing appropriate priorities for targeted research in the space;

 

• Providing evidence-based approaches and recommendations for research methodologies in sports and exercise medicine for researchers interested in conducting research in the space and/or conducting research through an equity lens.

 
Dr. Kliethermes described the Research Summit as a “tremendous success,” stating:

The energy and optimism in our ability to use research to make progress and create lasting change on health disparities in sports medicine was extremely high during the summit and in the days following. I’m looking forward to getting our Summit outcomes published over the course of the year and helping guide future research in this space.

 
For more information, please visit the Research Summit website

R13 Grants support scientific meetings, conferences, and workshops relevant to the NIH’s mission and scientific priorities.

Josh Roth, PhD, received the UW Department of Orthopedics and Rehabilitation 2023 Pilot Award for his proposal, “Identifying the biological mechanisms of longitudinal changes in ligament mechanical and sensory function associated with osteoarthritis: A preliminary analysis.”

Sparked by what he describes as the “critical unmet need” for improved understanding of the progressive worsening of ligament dysfunction associated with spontaneous osteoarthritis (OA), Dr. Roth and his team are determined to address this knowledge deficiency through their research – as they believe this lack of understanding often limits the ability of clinicians to personalize OA treatments.

Their long-term goal is to develop and translate personalized treatments for patients with OA across the disease spectrum. As a next step towards this long-term goal, the overall objective of this project is to provide fundamental knowledge of progressive mechanical and sensory dysfunction of the knee ligaments and underlying changes in biomarkers concomitant with OA progression. Their central hypothesis is that intrinsic changes (e.g., ligament stiffness) to the ligament develop before extrinsic anatomic changes (e.g., osteophytes) and can be predicted from biological biomarkers.

The immediate positive impacts of this work include the establishment of a handheld tensiometer – a sensor his team developed to measure ligament tension non-invasively. Their tensiometer is a key tool for longitudinal tracking of ligament function. Further, this research would establish companion canines (i.e., dogs who are pets) as an innovative model for studying changes with OA and future treatments for these changes.

Dr. Roth and his team plan to use the data from this pilot study as crucial supportive data for an NIH R01 application this fall.

For more about Dr. Roth and his work, visit his laboratory website.

UW Department of Orthopedics and Rehabilitation’s Pilot Award Program supports novel and developing research of department faculty who are early in their professional careers. Targeted research areas that advance the fields of orthopedics and rehabilitation include basic discovery research, patient-based clinical research, patient-centered outcomes research, dissemination and implementation research, and community engagement research.