.jpg "Margaret A. Turk, MD photo")
Vice-Chairman
SUNY Upstate Department of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation
Margaret A. Turk, MD is SUNY Distinguished Service Professor of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation, Pediatrics, and Public Health & Preventive Medicine at SUNY Upstate Medical University (UMU). She is Vice Chairman of SUNY UMU Department of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation (PMR), began and directs the PMR Pediatric Rehabilitation Medicine clinical program serving children and adults with childhood onset disabilities, and participated in developing the brain injury medical services program at Upstate and the Centers at St. Camillus. She has promoted integrating disability education within medical school curricula locally and nationally, with development of the Disability Integration Toolkit (https://www.upstate.edu/pmr/education/toolkit/index.php).
Along with her clinical work in rehabilitation and education responsibilities, she has been active in research on life-long disability and health care accessibility issues, contributing peer-reviewed articles and book chapters on the topic. Most recently she contributed to the limited national information available about the adverse outcomes of people with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (IDD) and the pandemic. She is a co-PI for the Disability Research and Dissemination Center, a cooperative agreement with Center for Disease Control and Prevention National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities to increase their capacity for research and training related to disability and health, and co-chairs the advisory group for the NYS DOH Disability and Health Program. She serves as a consultant related to the health of people with IDD on a National Institute on Aging grant and a grant specific National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial research Data and Safety Monitoring Board member; she is a National Institutes of Health (NIH) working group member determining Rehabilitation Common Data Elements for funded research, serving on the Infant Pediatrics Subgroup. Dr. Turk is a founding and present Co-Editor-in-Chief of Disability and Health Journal.
Dr. Turk’s professional service includes participation in PMR national leadership and contributions to national/international reports on disability, rehabilitation services, health promotion, and research. She serves on a community board that supports person-centered services for people with disability and a member of the newly formed NYS OPWDD Medical Taskforce to enhance quality services and patient safety for people served through NYS OPWDD programs. She has received numerous awards for her contributions.
