Rachel Prusynski, DPT, PhD

    Assistant Professor, Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, UW School of Medicine
    Co-Director, ASPIRe Lab


    Biography:
    Rachel Prusynski is an Assistant Professor in the Division of Physical Therapy in the Department of Rehabilitation Medicine at the University of Washington. Her health services research agenda focuses on the intersections between health and reimbursement policy, therapy practice, and patient outcomes in post-acute care, specifically Skilled Nursing Facilities. She is a board certified clinical specialist in Neurologic Physical Therapy with a decade of clinical experience across the continuum from ICU to community-based care. Her experience in Haiti and in the U.S. working with low-income older adults guides her research interests in quality of care and equity for historically marginalized communities.  Dr. Prusynski is a Learning Health System scholar with BAYADA Home Health and serves as co-investigator of the Post-Acute Care Policy Impact Study and her research has been funded by the Foundation for Physical Therapy Research, the Health Policy and Administration Section of the American Physical Therapy Association (APTA), and the National Center for Advancing Translational Health Sciences through the Institute of Translational Health Science at the University of Washington. She serves on the APTA House of Delegates, on the Academy of Neurologic Physical Therapy Stroke Special Interest Group, and on the Research Committee of the Academy of Leadership and Innovation of the APTA. She is the 2022 winner of the 2022 APTA Dorothy Briggs Memorial Scientific Inquiry Award, awarded to an author in the Association’s Physical Therapy & Rehabilitation Journal (PTJ), whose research and discussion has made a measurable contribution to the knowledge base of physical therapy.