Understanding Access to Rehabilitation for Stroke Survivors: Talya Fleming, MD

WATCH TIME: 5 minutes

"Every stroke is different.… Every course of rehabilitation and recovery for each person is going to be different."

The American Association of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation (AAPM&R), founded in 1939, has spent more than 8 decades advancing and advocating for the field of physiatry. Aligned with its mission to maximize function and enhance quality of life for patients with disabling conditions, the organization continues to support physiatrists in their work restoring mobility, independence, and overall well-being for patients following adverse health events.

Physiatrists, who specialize in physical medicine and rehabilitation (PM&R), aim to restore functional ability and quality of life to individuals impaired or disabled by a previous health event. AAPM&R has hosted assemblies for 67 consecutive years and has grown to become the largest annual professional conference for physicians and rehabilitation clinicians in the United States.

The 2025 AAPM&R Annual Assembly, held October 22 to 25, 2025, in Salt Lake City, Utah, covered a variety of topics in the PM&R field, including technology and the incorporation of AI, hands-on training, long COVID, and more. During the assembly, Talya Fleming, MD, medical director of the stroke recovery program at the Hackensack Meridian Health JFK Johnson Rehabilitation Institute in Edison, New Jersey, gave a presentation regarding rehabilitation care for stroke survivors.

Titled "Access to Rehabilitation Care for Stroke Survivors: Old Problems and New Solutions," the presentation reviewed published and newly available data that highlighted problems of access to rehabilitation care for stroke survivors and explored disparities of care affecting subgroups of stroke survivors. The presentation also analyzed structural deficits that created barriers to stroke rehabilitation and provided innovative approaches for delivering rehabilitation within the home and community, aiming to mitigate some of these barriers to care.

Following the meeting, Fleming sat down with NeurologyLive® for an exclusive interview regarding her presentation and the broader landscape of stroke rehabilitation care. During the interview, Fleming emphasized the ongoing challenges in rehabilitation care, namely, access to care and design of care systems, as well as how emerging technologies and care logistics are reshaping the field.