SRS Student Research Project Proposals

Access to rehabilitation services can be significantly influenced by multimorbidity (MM). Persons with multimorbidity, two or more co-occurring chronic conditions, often face greater health needs across multiple health domains. These complex health needs are often met with health system challenges such as difficulties in meeting care needs (e.g. financial and logistical barriers), fragmented health systems, and delays in referral and competing treatment priorities. Rehabilitation therapists can address these needs given the biopsychosocial and interdisciplinary nature of their services. With the growing proportion of people living with multimorbidity, it is critical to understand the most common groups or patterns of MM that receive rehabilitation care. This project will focus on a rapid review of the existing evidence to explore the varying groups or patterns of MM that are commonly receiving rehabilitation, where those services are commonly accessed and the role of rehabilitation therapy with this population. The details of this opportunity will be co-created with the student based on interest, but may include the opportunity to participate in some data collection and analysis including qualitative and/or quantitative methods, and interacting with patients/patient partners.

This project is designed to support 2 students to work collaboratively; therefore, supporting 2 half projects. This project requires two students to ensure rigor in the literature review process.

• Express Interest

This research project aims to explore the interdisciplinary role of PT, OT and SLP in providing supports and services for Autistic adults through a scoping review of existing literature. Provincial wait lists for assessment and diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder for adults is 5-years, posing a significant barrier to equitable provision of health care and timely post-diagnostic supports in Saskatchewan. Through a competency-based lens, we seek to inquire: 1) do PT, OT and SLPs play a role within the diagnostic process (e.g. identification of autistic traits, referral for diagnosis, assessment within diagnostic process), and can this lead to more timely provision of services for this patient group?; and 2) what are the PT, OT, and SLP roles within post-diagnostic supports and services for Autistic adults?

The successful MPT candidate will learn the foundations of conducting a systematic review, such as forming a search strategy, applying inclusion and exclusion criteria, and analyzing literature. The student will gain knowledge of the process of ethics and will be supported to obtain verification of ethics certificate or exemption in March 2026. If the student has an interest in authorship, we can create opportunities for collaborative writing to work towards a publication in a peer reviewed journal (to be aligned with the project report and abstract due) or a poster presentation.

• Express Interest

Neurodivergent individuals attending university (e.g., those who have Autism, ADHD, or learning disabilities) are at high risk of experiencing mental health challenges and of dropping out. Having strong social connections during university can mitigate these risks, supporting academic achievement and overall wellbeing; however, social isolation is common due to stigma, and other risk factors. University support programs usually focus on academics and health services rather than social inclusion. Using a participatory action research (PAR) approach, this project will investigate the social needs of neurodivergent students on campus, aiming to understand what supports their social inclusion on campus and the barriers they face. The project will involve engaging in 2-3 small action-focused projects that will be developed through consultation with the neurodivergent community on campus. These may include things like leading a petition for specific campus-wide changes, writing letters to stakeholders, providing an educational presentation on campus, or organizing activities that promote social connection for neurodivergent students on campus. Within the project period, the student’s role will be to co-develop an ethics application, organize and lead student engagement sessions to plan project actions, plan and carry out actions, and support knowledge mobilization of our findings.

• Express Interest

Seventy-five percent of people with a spinal cord injury (SCI) have bowel problems, with issues like
constipation, fecal incontinence, and needing excessively long time to empty the bowels. An international
research team has been testing how a small, home-based device delivers safe and comfortable electrical pulses to the abdomen, 30 minutes before bowel routine, would improve bowel function (e.g., shortened
bowel routine). Concurrently, this qualitative study will study the practicality and acceptability of abdominal transcutaneous electrical stimulation (TES) to enhance bowel management for people living with SCI. These results combined with the results from the pilot study will help develop a plan for a large international study in Canada, Switzerland and Norway to confirm these findings, potentially creating a new treatment that improves the quality of life for people with SCI.

General duties will include reviewing the literature on this topic, co-interviewing study participants about their experience with TES, qualitative analysis, and contribution to study outputs (i.e., poster, manuscript, presentation).

• Express Interest

Activity-based therapy (ABT) is a type of neurorehabilitation that involves repetitive, task-specific movement which targets below the level of the spinal cord injury (SCI) to promote neurorecovery. It can include the use of neurotechnology (e.g., functional electrical stimulation (FES), FES cycling, exoskeleton, brain-computer interface, body-weight support treadmill). People living with SCI have observed that ABT provides physical and mental health benefits. It has also contributed to neurological recovery, independence,and hope. These individuals consider ABT a lifelong approach to their recovery process. However, the use of ABT across clinical settings in Canada varies widely. Health care providers have a desire for education and training about ABT, working toward a credentialling process. To meet this need, in partnership with the Canadian ABT Community of Practice, we are developing and implementing an ABT clinical training course for health care providers.

General duties will be contributing the the development of an ABT clinical training course for health care providers. Specifically this means translating content into an online e-learning platform, creating an open access clinical training pressbook, attending ABT education working group meetings as needed, and contributing to related outputs (i.e., manuscript, poster, presentation).

This project is designed to support 2 students to work collaboratively; therefore, supporting 2 half projects.

• Express Interest

This project aims to explore how disabled OTs and PTs experience ableism within their professional practice settings. The study will examine interpersonal, institutional, and structural forms of ableism encountered in clinical work, workplace culture, professional development and advancement opportunities. By centering disabled clinicians' narratives, the project seeks to identify key barriers, sources of resilience, and oportunities to advance equity and inclusion in rehabilitation professions. Research questions include: 1. How do disabled OTs and PTs describe their experiences of overt and subtle ableism in clinical contexts? 2. What policies, norms, and expectations contribute to exclusion and marginalization, 3. What strategies do disabled clinicians use to navigate or resist ableism in their practice? 4. What systemic changes would support more inclusive, accessible, and equitable practice environments? Methods will include semi-structured interviews with disabled OTs and PTs using a phenomenological methodology. Student duties will include: literature review (approx. 55 hours), recruitment of 16-20 participants (approx. 20 hours), data collection (approx 45 hours), transcription and data management (approx. 55 hours), data analysis (approx. 65 hours), and knowledge mobilization (approx. 35 hours). Administrative tasks, including meetings with supervisor are allocated for the remaining 25 hours.

• Express Interest

Background: Access to pediatric Speech-Language Pathology (SLP) services in Saskatchewan is limited, particularly for Indigenous and marginalized communities. Understanding community needs and service gaps is critical for improving culturally responsive and equitable care. This project will focus on the initial phase of a community needs assessment to identify gaps in pediatric SLP services and inform future research and intervention.

Research Topic: Assessing the needs of pediatric SLP services in Saskatchewan, identifying gaps in service delivery, and exploring what supports clinicians and communities require.

General Duties: Conduct literature reviews on pediatric SLP service delivery and cultural responsiveness; assist in planning and attending stakeholder meetings (e.g. clinicians, community representatives, health authorities); gather qualitative data on perceived gaps in services; help design survey and interview questions; support data organization and preliminary thematic analysis; participate in team discussions and knowledge translation activities. Students gain experience in community engagement, qualitative research, and cultural safety,skills relevant for address health equity and improving rehabilitation service

Expected Outcomes: A summary of existing literature on pediatric SLP needs and gaps; stakeholder input on barriers and priorities for service improvement; draft survey and interview tools for future phases of the needs assessment. 

• Express Interest

 Cerebral visual impairment (CVI) is a brain-based disorder that affects visual function and perceptual abilities in children with atypical brain development (causes include perinatal stroke, hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy, white matter damage of immaturity, etc). CVI is not well understood and can be easily mis- or under-diagnosed. Early diagnosis is important as functional vision contributes to typical development in reach, grasp, mobility, environmental navigation and social interaction.

In this project, the student will be collaborating with families with lived experience with CVI to develop an interview guide to be used in a future research study. The student will be expected to learn about the principles of family engagement in research and CVI prior to forming collaborations with families with lived experience who have volunteered as patient-partners. The student will be the primary point of contact with the families and will arrange meetings with them, co-create the semi-structured interview guide and validate it with other knowledge users. This interview guide will be used in a future study to understand family perspectives and experiences receiving a diagnosis of CVI, with the goal of developing a care pathway to be used in the Saskatchewan Health Authority. 

• Express Interest

Perinatal stroke is the leading cause of hemiparetic cerebral palsy. Visuospatial attention is the ability to attend to and process stimuli in all areas of the environment. Visuospatial attention may have an impact on how much a child is using their affected limb in daily activities. In this study, data was collected using the robotic Kinarm exoskeleton combined with infrared eye-tracking while children with perinatal stroke and typically developing controls completed an object hit task. The student will analyse this data using MATLAB to understand the intergration of visual attention (how much time a participant spends looking at the space associated with their affected and non-affected hemispheres) with motor movement (number of objects hit successfully, area of space that the limb covered). This data can also be compared with pencil and paper tasks, such as the line-bisection task. Completion of this project can lead to the development of a manuscript for submission to a scholarly journal for publication. Knowledge and experience of MATLAB or robotics is not required and can be learned during the project term.

• Express Interest

People with speech and motor impairments often experience communication difficulties. Some individuals use augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) (i.e., graphic symbols, speech generating devices) in face-to-face communication. However, this type of communication may be extremely slow and many individuals experience difficulties in keeping up with the speed of the conversation. Research studies found that many people with speech and motor impairments who rely on AAC enjoy written communication in asynchronous interactions, as it allows them to participate in activities at their own pace. This qualitative research study will explore how people who rely on AAC use generative AI tools (i.e., ChatGPT) for written communication to participate in various activity settings (i.e., social media, gaming, education, healthcare) as well as the perceived benefits, challenges in using these AI tools for each activity setting. You will be working alongside with the supervisor in: a) preparing an ethics application; b) working with an advisory committee, including people who use AAC; c) conducting semi-structured intereviews with people who use AAC; d) transcribing the interviews; e) conducting data analysis using thematic analysis; f) presenting the findings at the SRS Research Day.

• Express Interest

Research evidence indicates that people with communication disorders often experience challenges in participating in their healthcare. Those who use augmentiative and alternative communication (AAC) (i.e., gestures, pictures, graphic symbols, speech generating devices) report that their caregivers often speak on their behalf in healthcare appointments. The Emergency Department may be especially a challenging setting for people with communication disorders. Long wait times, overcrowding may priroritize efficiency, whereas the person who uses AAC needs sufficient time to communicate. This scoping review will identify and describe how healthcare professionals are providing services to people with communication disorders who use AAC in the Emergency Department settings. This scoping review will be conducted using the PRISMA guidelines. Under the guidance of the supervisor, you will learn how to register the protocol for a scoping review. You will be working with the librarian to conduct a systematic search of electronic databases, using key search terms. You will be collaborating with another reviewer to independently screen, first the article titles, and then the full articles, based on a pre-determined inclusion and exclusion criteria, and meeting regularly to discuss any discrepancies from the screenings. You and another reviewer will be extracting the data from the studies which meet the study criteria. Finally, you will be presenting the findings at the SRS Research Day.

This project is designed to support 2 students to work collaboratively; therefore, supporting 2 half projects.

• Express Interest

Physical therapy is more than biomechanics—it’s about people. Yet systemic racism continues to perpetuate inequitable healthcare experiences and outcomes among diverse populations. In this project, you will co-create Health Justice Teaching & Learning Tools in partnership with a team of scholars in Australia—a set of tools designed to help educators and students consider, apply, integrate, and embody social and health justice concepts in teaching and learning spaces. The tools will serve as a flexible resource for classroom and clinical teaching, encouraging dialogue and collective problem-solving around creating safer healthcare contexts and redressing racism in PT practice, locally and globally. This is part of a larger research project focusing on developing a Pathway toward health justice in PT education and practice. Your work will contribute to safer, more inclusive care environments and help drive equitable health outcomes for all populations.

General duties: Conduct literature scan (academic & grey); collaborate with faculty and peers to design tool content (discussion prompts, case scenarios, reflective questions etc.); pilot test the learning tools and gather feedback; summarize findings & propose recommendations for implementation in rehabilitation teaching & learning. Skills gained: educational innovation, equity-focused practice, knowledge translation strategies, enhance application of health justice concepts & arts-based methods, international collaboration.

• Express Interest

Breast cancer survivors represent a rapidly growing population, and while survival rates are high, many experience long-term upper limb challenges—including rotator cuff–related pain and stiffness that impact everyday function. Our research group has already identified important shoulder movement (kinematic) changes in this population, and we are now digging deeper to understand what is happening inside the shoulder. Internal structural factors—such as tendon changes and narrowing of the subacromial space—may explain why certain survivors develop secondary shoulder injuries, but this has not yet been fully explored.

Research Question:
Do shoulder structural features—specifically supraspinatus tendon thickness and acromiohumeral distance (AHD)—differ in breast cancer survivors who show clinical signs of rotator cuff pain?

You will play a key role in answering this clinically important question. Your primary responsibility will be to extract quantitative measures from previously collected ultrasound images from ~30 participants. You will be trained to measure: Supraspinatus tendon thickness; AHD. You will be trained to compare measurements between survivors with and without shoulder pain. Finding from this study will contribute to a larger study and student will have opportunity to be a part of the publication of the larger study. Training on ultrasound measurements will be provided.

• Express Interest

Shoulder dysfunction is a prevalent and debilitating sequela following breast cancer treatment involving mastectomy and breast reconstruction, affecting up to 80% of survivors. This physical impairment limits activities of daily living, occupational function and quality of life. Current rehabilitation protocols often utilize generalized exercise routines, failing to account for the subtle, yet critical, kinematic alterations in the shoulder girdle caused by treatments.

Research Question: What are the specific biomechanical and kinematic alterations of the shoulder girdle reported in the literature following mastectomy and/or breast reconstruction, and how can these evidence-based findings be translated into tailored therapeutic exercise protocols designed to correct the identified dysfunctions?

The student will thoroughly investigate 10–15 peer-reviewed articles detailing the objective biomechanical changes (kinematics) observed in the scapulothoracic and glenohumeral joints of breast cancer survivors following mastectomy and/or reconstruction. The goal is to create a detailed "kinematic fingerprint" of the typical dysfunctions—including altered scapulohumeral rhythm, force couple imbalances, and postural adaptations—that contribute to long-term impairment.

The student will develop a comprehensive and evidence-based suite of tailored therapeutic exercises designed to specifically correct each identified kinematic issue.

• Express Interest

Saskatchewan lacks a formal pediatric instrumented gait assessment program, requiring families to travel out of province. A provincial working group of healthcare professionals, administrators, patient-partners, and researchers is conducting a needs assessment to identify service gaps, barriers, and stakeholder priorities. The project has several different components: a mixed methods survey, a large data project describing prevalence of physical impairment in children in SK, and finally a participatory action style round table event with stakeholders from across the province. The student working on this project would be responsible for co-designing and co-leading a half day knowledge sharing event with relevant stakeholders from across Saskatchewan in the Fall of 2026. They will then be responsible for summarizing findings and presenting ideal service design, preferred tools and approaches for walking assessment for children in Saskatchewan. This project will include supporting an application for local funding, literature review and the knowledge sharing event. It will also include drafting results and discussion from the event and supporting development of knowledge mobilisation activities. Findings will inform the development of a sustainable, equitable gait analysis program in Saskatchewan.

• Express Interest

Dementia affects half a million people in Canada and is the main reason many older adults lose independence. One of the first changes is how people walk, they may walk more slowly or less steadily, which raises the risk of falling and makes daily life harder. Walking isn’t just important for getting around; it’s also closely connected to brain health. Studies show that being active, especially walking regularly, can help keep the brain sharp and boost mood. This study is testing a new walking program supported by physiotherapists. It uses a small ankle sensor called Heel2Toe that makes sounds when a good step is taken to help people improve their walking pattern. The idea is to make walking practice safer, more fun, and more effective for people in the early stages of dementia. By helping people walk better and walk more often, the program aims to support both physical and mental health, lower the risk of falls, and improve quality of life.

This student will support ethics application from Jan - Mar 2026; Literature review Mar - Jun 2026; Preparation and training for data collection May/June 2026; data collection and PT intervention summer 2026; data analysis for first 10 participants (Sept - Feb 2026); Presentation May 2026. This project will also include possible conference presentations and a publication for pilot data and protocol.

• Express Interest