Dr. Clewley is an assistant professor of Orthopaedic Surgery and the assistant director of the Duke Center of Excellence in Manual and Manipulative Therapy
What excites you about your role at Duke?
Many things! While the institution has so many things to offer, the people that surround me make being and working here exciting. I am energized by our influential high-capacity faculty that I can collaborate with and our talented and gifted students. My desire to enter the academic space was based primarily on opportunities to teach and have an impact on the next generations of physical therapists. To be an integral part of our students’ journeys excites me most about my role here.
Tell us about your research interests and what you enjoy about research.
My three areas of focus are neck pain, physical therapist burnout, and youth running. I really enjoy discovering more questions to ask. I always considered research a means to answer questions or resolve clinical dilemmas. Ultimately, research leads to more questions to answer. And at some point, all we can do is synthesize the answers to the many questions to make meaningful clinical conclusions. But we are always in a state of seeking.
What excites you about teaching?
I enjoy being a part of the student's journey of discovery, which leads to clinical competence and confidence. I am energized by students; they have so many questions and curiosities of their own. To be trusted by them to guide them on their journey is one of life's greatest honors.
Where do you see your specific field and specialty advancing in the next five years?
My specialty area is orthopaedic physical therapy. I hope ortho PTs are recognized as primary care providers for musculoskeletal complaints. Ortho PTs are well-suited to be first-line providers, and the literature supports this mechanism of care delivery. More research is necessary, of course.
My sub-specialty is manual therapy. I have enjoyed watching the evolution of manual therapy over the past 20 years and seeing those with manual therapy backgrounds better equipped to manage various conditions. The area I am most interested in is neck pain and I strive to unpack the complexities of managing neck pain.
What brings you personal joy?
Improvement in all areas of my life. I hope every day I become a better father, husband, friend, teacher, researcher, and runner. Family is the most important thing in my life especially my wife and two kids. We also have two dogs.
We are a running family, and it seems that we center a lot of what we do around running. I love to run, and I love being a student of running. I am fortunate enough to stay relatively healthy and able to push myself to my limits. It is a means to finding the best version of myself.
Hometown
Great Falls, Montana
Education
University of Montana, BS in Psychology, MS in Physical Therapy
Shenandoah University, DPT
Rocky Mountain University, PhD in Health Professions