I had the pleasure of meeting Steven George at the American Pain Society meeting. He has done some excellent work and is part of a truly impressive group of people working out of the University of Florida. Now this blog post is simply to pay tribute to what is a great achievement – Dr George has just been announced as the winner of the 2012 Ulf Lindblom Award from the IASP. What is it? Well only the poshest award open to a early-mid-career PT researcher in the pain field! The Ulf Lindblom award is given to the outstanding Clinical Scientist under 40 working in a pain-related field. It is great to see a PT getting amongst it and it is people like Steve who are flying the flag. However, perhaps I am getting carried away – let’s make sure he deserves it:
Steven Z. George, PT, PhD is Associate Professor and Assistant Department Chair at the University of Florida, Department of Physical Therapy. OK – he got his bachelor’s degree in PT from West Virginia University, summa cum laude (1994) and worked clinically until 2001. So, he has some clinical runs on the board. He pulled off a Masters and then doctorate from University of Pittsburgh, followed by a post-doctoral fellowship in the Center for Pain Research and Behavioral Health and Brooks Center for Rehabilitation Studies at the University of Florida in 2004. So far, he is looking pretty good.
He has written 110 peer-reviewed papers, is on the Editorial Board for Physical Therapy and is an International Editorial Review Board Member for Journal of Orthopaedic & Sports Physical Therapy. In 2009 he was recognized by the University of Florida with the Jack Wessel Award Excellence Award for Assistant Professors and has won new investigator awards from both the American Physical Therapy Association (Eugene Michels New Investigator Award – 2007), American Pain Society (John C. Liebeskind Early Career Scholar Award – 2009), and now, the Big Kahuna – the International Association for the Study of Pain Ulf Lindblom Award for Clinical Science – 2012.
Steve’s primary research interests involve the use of biopsychosocial models for the prevention and treatment of chronic musculoskeletal pain disorders. His research projects include: 1) Developing and testing behavioral interventions for patients with low back pain; 2) Investigating the interaction between pain related genetic and psychological factors in the development of post-operative chronic shoulder pain; 3) Investigating pain sensitivity mechanisms and efficacy of manual therapy; and 4) Developing and testing low back pain prevention programs for Soldiers in the United States Army.
OK – settled. He well deserves it. Hats off. A hearty congratulations Steve – great work thus far and, obviously, keep it up!
If you really want to check him out – go here
About Lorimer Moseley
Lorimer is NHMRC Senior Research Fellow with twenty years clinical experience working with people in pain. After spending some time as a Nuffield Medical Research Fellow at Oxford University he returned to Australia in 2009 to take up an NHMRC Senior Research Fellowship at Neuroscience Research Australia (NeuRA). In 2011, he was appointed Professor of Clinical Neurosciences & the Inaugural Chair in Physiotherapy at the University of South Australia, Adelaide. He runs the Body in Mind research groups. He is the only Clinical Scientist to have knocked over a water tank tower in Outback Australia.
Link to Lorimer’s published research here. Downloadable PDFs here.