Determining Optimal Exercise Strategies and Promoting a Continuum of Care for Males and Females following Stroke and Heart Disease
Susan Marzolini
KITE FIBRE
Susan Marzolini
Dr. Marzolini is an Exercise Physiologist and Registered Kinesiologist. Her professional objective is to advocate for increasing the opportunity for people to access structured physical activity and risk factor modification programs following stroke. She designed and developed Toronto Rehab/UHN’s Exercise and Risk Factor Modification Program for People following Stroke (TRI-REPS). Her research interests are to examine the dose-response relationship between exercise and health related outcomes in people with stroke and cardiac disease. Using novel exercise training methods her aim is to determine an exercise treatment aimed at promoting long-term health, repairing the brain and restoring lost mobility after stroke. Another focus of her research is to determine ways to reduce sex disparities in outcomes and access to secondary prevention programming (stroke and heart disease) given that women have a higher rate of all-cause mortality, more severe strokes, and experience worse health outcomes such as more depressive symptoms, that can be improved with exercise. Dr. Marzolini was recognized as one of the top 10 productive authors globally and 3rd in Canada of cardiac rehabilitation and related research publications over the last 20 years determined by a bibliometric review (Frontiers in CV Medicine, 2021). She was among 24 people globally who were selected as Emerging Leaders in Stroke Prevention, Rehabilitation, and Treatment by the World Heart Federation (2018).