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- Jeena Elizabeth JoseTBI AmbassadorRolePhysical Therapist and Clinical InstructorLocationCaliforniaFun Facts
Jeena, her husband, and two kids came to the United States in 2008 from Abu Dhabi. Her older son is in college, and her younger son is in second grade. Jeena’s life revolves around her family and work. Her hobbies are music, dancing, painting, cooking, and travel. She does miss her family, pets, and home in India, but still plans trips to visit when they are able.
Jeena’s journey with TBI
Jeena has been a Physical Therapist since 2002. She began her career working in India and parts of the Middle East and started to work in California in 2011. She has held different roles as a physical therapy assistant, physical therapist, educator, documentation auditor, and Director of Rehabilitation in all rehabilitation settings. She holds several certifications in her practice, from interests that grab her attention to new research and courses that can improve her knowledge and ability to serve her patients and their families more efficiently. Her current position is as a Physical Therapist working with various types of patient groups and diagnoses at Loma Linda Inpatient Rehabilitation.
Jeena considers herself lucky enough to have worked with some great clinicians throughout her career. With their guidance she has been able to contribute towards setting up rehabilitation clinics, SCI treatment centers, and brain injury education and training centers for the pediatric population. She now caters to all medical diagnoses and feels she learns something every day. She particularly enjoys working with SCI, TBI, and BURNS patients. With such life-changing injuries, the patient and the entire family rely on guidance from their medical professionals. Jeena hopes to carry her knowledge to educate the next generation of therapists and to parts of the world like her hometown in India, where resources such as these are invaluable.
Why does Jeena want to be an ambassador?
Jeena treats all her patients as family, so she is always on the lookout for the best educational and treatment options available, which is why she always recommends MSKTC to her patients and their caregivers. It is occasionally difficult to find new and updated research-based resources in one spot, but the resources with MSKTC are easy to navigate and the language is easy to understand. She particularly favors topics like the Wheelchair-Parts Management courses and the quizzes that test user understanding. This is particularly useful for her current work setting due to the vast amount of material she must cover in her brief time with a patient. She confidently recommends MSKTC to her patients as it helps them learn, review, and reinforce quality information relevant to them and their families. She especially appreciates how the info-comics in SCI, TBI, and BURNS can grab the attention of younger pediatric patients. As a robotics specialist, she was happy to see the most recent exoskeleton technology that is discussed and reviewed further on this website.
What has Jeena done as an ambassador?
Jeena shares the MSKTC resources with her doctors and patients and has encouraged patients to share their resources with their peer groups for increased visibility. All resources presented on SCI, TBI, and BURNS are indeed the questions and concerns of most patients and caregivers as they continue their journey of healing and rehabilitation. She sees the MSKTC resources continuing to serve a valuable role within her organization and in venues where she exercises her professional expertise.
- Nelson GonzalezTBI AmbassadorRoleOccupational Therapist and Executive Director at Rehab Without WallsLocationFloridaFun Facts
Nelson has a large loving family (wife, 5 siblings, 3 children and 15 nieces/nephews). If Nelson wasn’t so busy with family, work, and staying physically fit, there is a very good possibly you would catch him at a drum circle!
Nelson has been an occupational therapist (OT) since 2004. In his time, he has gathered several certifications and formed many affiliations with prominent therapy organizations that focus on spinal cord injury (SCI) and traumatic brain injury (TBI). As a therapy leader and clinician, Nelson has helped restore function to clients who have disabilities following disease or profound injuries like SCI and TBI among many others. Nelson serves as the executive director of Rehab Without Walls NeuroSolutions in Florida. He has been a strong advocate for the value of rehab professionals’ role in a patient’s journey to accomplishing skills needed for life as well as using evidence-based practice to support their role.
Why does Nelson want to be an ambassador?
Nelson loves to share high quality research-based resources like the ones produced by the MSKTC that he believes in. Nelson points out that there is so much room for improvement in the services provided for people with disabilities, particularly in Florida with the lack of adaptive beaches and home & community based services. By being an ambassador, he shares the free research-based MSKTC resources with patients and clinicians to help achieve better rehabilitation outcomes.
What has Nelson done as an ambassador?
Nelson has used MSKTC’s resources to educate his staff at Rehab Without Walls in Florida whom he oversees so they can in turn educate patients/clients as well as family members and caregivers. Nelson hopes to use the reach of his national company to spread the word on MSKTC’s resources by posting MSKTC resources on the intranet page for all staff working for Rehab Without Walls.