Leadership

William C Walker, MD

William C Walker, MD is Professor and Vice Chairman of Clinical Care of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation (PM&R) at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) in Richmond, VA, and Site Director of Richmond Defense & Veterans Brain Injury Center (R-DVBIC). He is licensed to practice medicine in Virginia and has been continuously board certified in PM&R since 1992. Dr Walker obtained a BS degree in Chemical Engineering at The University of Virginia (UVA) followed by a Medical Degree from VCU’s Medical College of Virginia. He then completed a one-year internship in Internal Medicine at a UVA affiliate followed by three-year PM&R residency program at VCU including selection and service as Chief Resident. After residency, he joined the VCU Department of PM&R in 1991 to begin his academic medical career which has progressed to full professorship. Through an academic partnership, he has practiced part-time at the Veteran’s Affairs Medical Center in Richmond through most of his career, and was selected as Principal Investigator of R-DVBIC in 2000.

In addition to VCU PM&R Clinical Vice Chairman and Site Director of R-DVBIC at the McGuire VAMC, Dr Walker’s administrative roles include medical director Brain Injury Rehabilitation Programs at VCU Health System (VCUHS) and medical director of the VCUHS Rehabilitation Research and Training Center (RRTC). The VCUHS RRTC is a Top-25 Rehabilitation Hospital selection by US News & World Report (2008). Other clinical and administrative experience in brain injury rehabilitation includes 1) medical directorship and clinical care of a hospital-based coma recovery/ transitional care unit and 2) medical directorship, medical executive committee presidency and patient care of a free-standing 40 bed inpatient rehabilitation hospital with a dedicated brain-injury unit. He has lectured extensively, been recipient of the department Teaching Excellence award, and has served on the Study Guide Committee for the American Academy of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation. He also is an active reviewer for several prominent medical rehabilitation journals.

Dr Walker has research experience in a diversity of rehabilitation fields, and has a special interest in brain injury. He has conducted numerous randomized clinical trials and is the local principal investigator on an ongoing multicenter brain injury research grant funded by the Department of Defense (DoD). He recently was award a Congressionally Directed Medical Research Program a $1.6 million four year grant to study the concussion effects of blast injury in military personnel. His publications include twenty-four peer review journal full-length articles (fifteen as first author), twenty journal abstracts, and several book chapters. These publications have appeared in a variety of journals, including Muscle Nerve, Journal of Head Trauma Rehabilitation, Brain Injury, Neurorehabilitation, Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, American Journal of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Journal of Spinal Cord Medicine, and others.

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