Kath Benfer

My doctoral research was the first to explore prevalence of oropharyngeal dysphagia (OPD) in a population-based cohort of preschool children with cerebral palsy (CP) using direct clinical measures; resulting in publication in Pediatrics (Benfer 2013). My thesis established new synthesis and testing of OPD measure psychometrics (Benfer 2012a, 2014c), improving the validity of my prevalence results. OPD was found in majority of children with CP (Benfer 2013) and not limited to those with poor gross motor function (Benfer 2015a, 2014a, 2013). Functional limitations were described in relation to gross motor function, enabling earlier screening and intervention. This study was replicated in a comparative study of children with CP in Bangladesh. It was unique in that it employed consistent methods and raters for CP diagnosis and functional ratings; enabling greater insight into the markedly different clinical picture of CP in a low-resource setting (Benfer 2014, Benfer 2016). This work earned a nomination for the international Gayle Arnold Award for Excellence and publication in Pediatrics (Benfer 2014). My contributions to research in the field of disability in Bangladesh are not limited to my own outputs, but also include supervision of masters and honours students, and research mentoring of clinicians. As a new researcher, my work has had a significant impact, including 13 publications, 143 citations, and 37 conference presentations (31 international).