Molly Verrier

MHSc, Dip (P & 0T)

Optimizing recovery for people with neurological disorders

For researcher Molly Verrier, helping a patient to grasp a piece of paper for the first time following a spinal cord injury is deeply inspiring.

“To you and me it seems like nothing, but for individuals to be able to accomplish daily tasks, such as picking up a letter, it’s incredibly important,” says Verrier, a Senior Scientist at Toronto Rehab. 

It’s what Verrier’s research is all about: identifying the most appropriate therapies to optimize motor control and movement of upper and lower limbs in people with spinal cord injuries, stroke and traumatic brain injury.

“I’m interested in helping patients function in their daily lives. It’s not just does your arm work better, but can you use it in a productive way that allows you to do meaningful activities?” she explains.  

Verrier brings a passion to her work that dates back to childhood. At the age of 12, she broke a leg when her toboggan hit an iron post. When the cast finally came off, her leg didn’t work.  

“There was no rehabilitation in the small Ontario town where I lived so I had to do it myself,” she recalls. So Verrier designed her own program of therapy – and it worked. “From that time on, I wanted to be a physical therapist.”

And that’s exactly what she did, training as a physical therapist and occupational therapist at the University of Toronto. Today, she is a renowned rehabilitation scientist in Canada and internationally.

“What’s exciting is that basic science is moving so quickly. It’s a time where you can figure out how to saddle up to the new technologies and treatments to figure out how to truly optimize what we’re doing,” says Verrier. “The future is so bright.”

Verrier is also seeking ways to better measure the rehabilitation needs of each patient. She helped develop the Community Balance and Mobility Scale, which was designed to evaluate people who have balance problems brought on by traumatic brain injury. The approach looks promising and has just undergone validity testing.

Whatever the injury, Verrier believes each patient’s therapeutic program “needs to be customized to the individual – because each patient is specific. I want it to have the specificity, duration, frequency and repetition required to gain maximum functional ability.”

For this reason, she is also studying service delivery – and how it can be improved to allow for more optimal and customized rehabilitation. “Distinctive excellence is important in rehabilitation.”

One of Verrier’s studies showed the different funding systems that exist depending on where a spinal cord injury occurs – and the implications for rehabilitation therapy.

“For example, if you are a runner and you trip in the street, fall down and break your neck – and there is nobody to sue – you become a quadriplegic who is essentially managed by the public funding system.

“If you trip over a cord at work, have the same injury and are covered by the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board, you will see a lot of different benefits coming your way that help you get reintegrated into work and function,” Verrier says.

Her goal: “To make sure that the right services are given to the right client at the right time, and that they make a difference in the actual function and recovery of that individual.” 

Publications since 2000 - coming soon

Curriculum Vitae