MRRI is excited to announce that former Director and Institute Scientist Emeritus John Whyte, MD, PhD, has been selected to receive the Distinguished Member Award from the Association of Academic Physiatrists (AAP). The AAP is a professional organization dedicated to improving patient care by advancing physical medicine and rehabilitation (physiatry) through research and education.
The AAP Distinguished Member Award is given to internationally recognized leaders in the field of physiatry who have made significant contributions to the field through their teaching, research, and academic publications and who have demonstrated a history of service to the AAP. Only one candidate per year may be nominated for this award.
Over the course of his career, Dr. Whyte has made substantial clinical and research contributions to the field of neurorehabilitation. He served as principal investigator in establishing the world-class Moss Traumatic Brain Injury Model System and collaborated with subsequent PI’s, Tessa Hart, PhD, and Amanda Rabinowitz, PhD, in its successful development for more than 20 years. Model Systems are highly-competitive federally funded centers of excellence for both treatment and research related to a particular disability. In addition, Dr. Whyte has played a critical role in developing and disseminating the Rehabilitation Treatment Specification System, a standardized system for specifying the components of rehabilitation treatments. Through his research, Dr. Whyte has improved our understanding of attention and executive function impairments in traumatic brain injury, and he has meaningfully advanced clinical practice surrounding the assessment and treatment of disorders of consciousness after brain injury.
Beyond his clinical contributions, Dr. Whyte has dedicated substantial effort to training the next generation of rehabilitation physicians and scientists through leadership of numerous career development initiatives over the years. These initiatives include designing the national Rehabilitation Medicine Scientist Training Program in 2001 (which he continues to co-direct with Michael Boninger, MD) and serving as PI of the T32 Postdoctoral Training Program in Translational Neurorehabilitation Research held jointly with the University of Pennsylvania.
MRRI congratulates Dr. Whyte on this well-deserved recognition for his many career achievements in research and education. He will be presented with the AAP Distinguished Member award on the final day of the AAP’s Annual Meeting, Friday, February 24, 2023.