Lindsay Alfano is our Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Committee Chair. She has been involved with the WMS since 2012 and was elected to our Executive Board in 2022. In this interview, Lindsay tells us about her career, her work with the WMS and her ambitions for EDI.
Lindsay graduated with a doctorate in physical therapy from The Ohio State University (OSU) before completing her paediatric physical therapy residency at OSU and Nationwide Children’s Hospital. As Lindsay puts it: “This is where my love of research and introduction into the world of neuromuscular disorders began.
“I’m an Assistant Professor in the Center for Biobehavioral Health in the Abigail Wexner Research Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital. Our neuromuscular physical therapy team focuses on critical evaluation and/or development of clinical outcome assessments, natural history and clinical trial readiness studies, and collaborative development of standards of care for patients with rare and ultrarare disorders.
“Our expertise enables us to contribute meaningfully to clinical trial design and interpretation. We also serve our patients across our clinics and in ongoing treatment trials.”
Lindsay goes on to describe her first contact with the WMS: “My first WMS meeting was in Perth and it was an eye-opening experience to see all the clinicians and researchers whose articles I’d been reading and learning from for years! I’ve attended just about every WMS Congress since then. The WMS is such a great community, and the scientific content and networking opportunities afforded at the annual Congress is second-to-none!”
When we held the Executive Board election in 2022, we asked all candidates whether they would be interested in joining one of our new committees. Lindsay says: “When first joining the Executive board in 2022, I was passionate about EDI and eager to help establish the EDI committee which was brand new in 2022. My hope was to bring together other passionate members to improve access to the amazing WMS Society and Congress, to bring more voices and ideas to the podium, and advocate for ongoing growth as a Society.”
Lindsay’s clear and thoughtful leadership of the EDI work has been essential to its success, but what does EDI at the WMS mean? “The EDI Committee spent quite a bit of time defining EDI within the WMS. We worked with a consultancy, Utopia, to help us navigate and prioritise our objectives and plans. We surveyed membership to ensure we were aware of areas of strength and opportunities for growth within the Society. We took part in strategy-building sessions in 2024 to fully define our Strategic pillars.”
The WMS EDI strategic pillars are to:
Why does Lindsay think it is important that the WMS makes progress on EDI? “Our Society continues to grow as the WMS Congress has become the foremost international event for sharing scientific knowledge in neuromuscular disorders. As our numbers increase, we need to be intentional and make thoughtful efforts to ensure everyone can join and be an active member of the WMS regardless of career stage, geographic region, gender, or discipline of training or practice.”
As Lindsay says: “The WMS has made amazing progress in just a few years! And it’s important to note that all of these initiatives were collaborative efforts across the Executive Board, WMS committees (including EDI), and based on feedback directly from the membership!
“We have adjusted membership rates to reduce the barrier to accessing all the benefits of a WMS membership and established the membership grant to provide additional assistance if even the current membership fee remains a barrier to membership.
“We expanded travel fellowships to reduce the financial burden of attending the Congress to include early career clinicians/researchers or those without permanent positions, first-time Congress attendees, as well as those finding travel costs burdensome at any career stage. We offer caregiver grants and a family-friendly space within the Congress to enable easier access to those members with caregiving responsibilities. AND we continue to offer a hybrid or virtual-only attendance options as well.
“The EDI committee has also worked to ensure our Congress venues and activities are accessible to members and attendees of all abilities. The WMS has expanded programming to include more diversity in educational opportunities with sessions specifically designed to provide networking and mentoring opportunities for new or early career attendees. The conference programme reflects an intended balance across basic/translational/clinical topics, with attention to a diversity of backgrounds among our speakers.
“We’ve also updated our WMS membership and Congress codes of conduct; made great strides through inclusion of Wordly to enable real-time translation of Congress or other live-streamed WMS content, such as the Myology Café; and we’ve established an online process to receive membership feedback, including complaints or concerns.
“One more exciting change in 2025 – the new Executive Board will be elected in October. This new board will have space for three first-time Executive board members, as well as an early career representative!”
The progress we have already made is impressive, but Lindsay isn’t content to consider the job done. She still has ambitions for the future of our EDI work: “We’ve made some great strides as a Society and are looking forward to our continued growth! Our EDI Committee priorities are to continue to advertise and tweak our existing programmes to ensure all members are aware and can access every opportunity. We are working with other Committees to improve the accessibility of material and content by reducing the language barrier through translation software. We want it to be easy for everyone to join in the conversation! We hope to continue to report on Society progress and actively seek feedback to adjust our goals and priorities accordingly.”
If all of this has inspired you to participate, Lindsay encourages all WMS members to get involved: “Members can sign up to join our committee at any time. We are always seeking feedback on areas of strength and opportunities for growth within the Society – so share your great thoughts and ideas with us!
“And we also encourage everyone to be aware of the variety of Committee options available within the WMS – it’s so easy to get involved!”
To express your interest in joining any of the WMS committees, please email [email protected].
This article is presented by the
Education & Development Opportunities Committee.
Published on 24 April 2025.
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