CHS Welcomes New Faculty – Meet Dr. Katherine Reyes-Brooks
Published October 23, 2023
By Darlene Muguiro
UTEP College of Health Sciences
This fall, the College of Health Sciences (CHS) is welcoming new faculty members across several departments.
We are pleased to present the eighth profile, featuring Dr. Katherine Reyes-Brooks, visiting clinical assistant professor of Physical Therapy and Movement Sciences. Reyes-Brooks received her Doctor of Physical Therapy degree from Hardin-Simmons University. She is currently a third-year doctoral student in the Interdisciplinary Health Sciences PhD Program at UTEP.
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Dr. Katherine Reyes-Brooks, visiting clinical assistant professor of Physical Therapy and Movement Sciences, says that she didn’t always think that she’d end up in the PT profession. Rather, the El Paso native’s love for home and attachment to family led her down a path toward clinical work.
“My original plan was to go to Texas A&M to become a veterinarian. But I didn’t know anyone going out there, and I really didn’t want to leave El Paso,” she said. “My sister told me about the Physical Therapy program at UTEP, and it sounded like something I would really like to do, so I went for it. I decided I would study hard and get good grades to help me in applications to PT school.”
Reyes-Brooks began studying at UTEP while also interviewing for several programs in Texas, including UTEP. She was accepted to UT Medical Branch at Galveston, where she received a bachelor's degree in health sciences and master’s degree in physical therapy. She returned to El Paso following graduation to practice as a physical therapist while simultaneously completing a transitional program at Hardin-Simmons University for practicing physical therapists to obtain their Doctor of Physical Therapy degree. Reyes Brooks’ clinical practice was broad, including work at schools, home health and assisted living facilities. In 2007, her father was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, which changed the course of her life in multiple ways.
“The diagnosis really helped me find a niche that I was very passionate about, and I began to work primarily with the neurologic population in my practice,” she said.
This passion later led Reyes-Brooks to begin guest lecturing for the DPT Program at UTEP annually during Dr. Michelle Gutierrez’s class, where she led a lecture and lab focused on Parkinson’s disease. She realized she could impact multiple lives through her role as an educator, and later decided to apply for entrance to the Interdisciplinary Health Sciences PhD Program. She is now preparing for an upcoming proposal defense.
“The research on Parkinson’s is constantly changing, so my teaching role helps keep me up to date, and my students up to date,” she said. “What I learned in PT school was very basic, and that’s just because of the information that was available at that time. Now, I’m getting so much more information out there through my students, which results in better treatment for these patients.”
Reyes-Brooks began teaching for UTEP full time this fall. She says the most meaningful part of teaching is seeing the visible changes with DPT students as they move from what she calls a “question face” to the “aha moment.” She also uses music in the classroom to engage students, a tool that she brought over from her clinical practice, working with patients on balance and coordination training.
“I knew that from my days as a clinician, if I was doing something to actively engage the patients, they would want to come back, so I just translated that to the classroom,” she said. “It really brings a spark to the discussion, and they start asking harder questions and using their clinical reasoning skills more frequently.”
Reyes-Brooks says that she hopes her students will one day come to understand physical therapy from a holistic perspective, specifically through the vantage point of patients’ caregivers and families.
“I want my students to learn from my personal experience of being a caregiver, because being someone’s caregiver helps you to be a better therapist," she said. “In reality, we’re treating that one person so they can get back to their life with their family. I want my students to be good therapists, not just smart therapists.”
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Go Miners!
For more information about the Doctor of Physical Therapy Program, please visit: www.utep.edu/chs/pt.
