Inaugural Dr. Joel DeLisa PM&R Endowed Lectureship

Hope and Hurdles: The Current Landscape of Spinal Cord Injury Research and Rehabilitation

This lectureship is brought to you by WSU Elson S. Floyd College of Medicine and Providence St. Luke’s Rehabilitation Medical Center.

Wednesday, May 14, 2025
11:30 a.m. – 1:00 p.m. PDT
Providence St. Luke’s Rehabilitation Medical Center, 711 South Cowley Street, Spokane, WA 99202: Room #200

Join via Zoom
Registration not required.

Speaker: Steven Kirshblum, MD

The inaugural Dr. Joel DeLisa PM&R Endowed Lectureship will feature guest speaker Steven Kirshblum, MD, chief medical officer for Kessler Institute for Rehabilitation and chair of the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School. He is board certified in physical medicine and rehabilitation and spinal cord injury medicine. He is a professor and chair of the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School and the spinal cord injury medicine fellowship program director. In addition, Dr. Kirshblum is the chief medical officer for the Kessler Foundation and co-director of its Center for Spinal Stimulation.

Dr. Kirshblum began his career at Kessler in 1990. He is the project co-director of the Northern New Jersey Model Spinal Cord Injury System, one of only 18 federally-designated centers in the country. He is a past President of the Academy of Spinal Cord Injury Professionals and American Paraplegia Society, past board member of the American Spinal Injury Association and has served and continues to serve on numerous advisory boards and foundations for spinal cord research. He is currently on the board of the Craig H. Neilsen Foundation. He is involved in research, with more than 240 peer-reviewed publications, is the editor of three textbooks in spinal cord injury medicine and a children’s book related to spinal cord injury. Dr. Kirshblum earned a bachelor’s degree in biology from Fairleigh Dickinson University and his medical degree from the University of Health Sciences/Chicago Medical School. He completed a residency in physical medicine and rehabilitation at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York.

The lectureship was established in 2024 when WSU alumni Joel DeLisa, MD, and Janet Hopper DeLisa established the Dr. Joel DeLisa Endowed Lectureship and Continuing Education Fund in Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation. The aim of the fund is to advance knowledge in the field of physical medicine and rehabilitation for students, residents, and practitioners in Spokane and beyond. The fund will be used to host annual lectureship series.

Dr. and Mrs. DeLisa are both 1964 WSU graduates. Dr. DeLisa went on to become the founding director of Kessler Medical Rehabilitation Research and Education Center and authored the internationally recognized textbook DeLisa’s Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation: Principles and Practice, now in its sixth edition.