is a licensed Physical Therapist with over 40 years of clinical practice treating difficult pain syndromes, entrapment neuropathies and other musculoskeletal and neurological injuries. She graduated from the University of Tennessee Health Science Center in Memphis, TN with a Masters Degree and then a Doctorate in Physical Therapy.
Dr. Stralka and two other colleagues wrote the first examination for the Orthopedic Specialty Certification through the American Board of Physical Therapy. She serves on the nomination committee for The Academy of Hand and Upper Extremity of the American Physical Therapy Association.
She has many publications to her credit and the two most recent were Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (2019) in Fundamentals of Hand Therapy, 3rd edition and Graded Motor Imagery in the last edition of Rehabilitation of the Hand in 2018.
Dr. Stralka has presented many courses to physicians and other health care individuals. She lectures both nationally and internationally. In December 2019 she lectured in Malmo, Sweden for the Hand and Upper Extremity Post graduate courses, and at the International Federation Society of Hand Therapist in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Dr. Stralka has received numerous honors throughout her career and was the recipient of the Dorothy B. Kaufmann Lectureship Award by the Philadelphia Hand Rehabilitation Foundation. In 2016, she was one of the recipients of the Honored Professors Award at the Philadelphia Hand Symposium. In 2013, 2014, 2017 and 2019 she had the privilege of seeing patients, lecturing and working with Dr. Birgitta Rosen OT, PhD at the Skane University Hospital in Malmo, Sweden. Susan continues to work part-time seeing patients, lecturing and teaching webinars.