Florida Veteran Health Heroes

Dr. Paul B. Arthur, OTR/L, OTA, is an Assistant Professor and Lead Faculty with St. Cather- ine University and a veteran of the United States Army Re- serves. He has been active in the field of occupational ther- apy for over 13 years, initially as a certified assistant, and later as a registered therapist. Dr. Arthur’s primary research interest is in dementia symptom management. He has also been active in student and provider competency assessment and has participated in projects with the American Occupational Therapy Association and the Army Reserves. Dr. Arthur is a combat Veteran of Operation Iraqi Free- dom and served for 11 years in the United States Army Reserves. He enlisted 10 weeks after the terrorist attack on September 11th, 2001 and completed basic training at Fort Jackson, South Carolina. From there, he was as- signed to Fort Sam Houston, Texas where he received training as a combat medic and as an occupational therapy assistant. In 2007, Dr. Arthur was commissioned as a second lieu- tenant in the medical service corps. His first assignment was as the executive officer of the 55th Medical Com- pany in Indianapolis, Indiana, a combat stress control unit responsible for providing behavioral health care interventions for service members. During this assign- ment he earned his Master of Science degrees in occu- pational therapy and gerontology from the University of Indianapolis. Dr. Arthur was promoted to 1st Lieutenant and deployed to Camp Liberty, Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Free- dom in 2009. While there, his unit provided behavior- al health care to service members over approximately two-thirds of the country. Dr. Arthur was awarded the Meritorious Service Medal, along with the Army Com- mendation Medal for service in combat. Upon returning stateside, Dr. Arthur was appointed as the Commander of the 55th Medical Company, respon- sible for planning and executing individual and col- lective training for 83 Soldiers to return to full mission readiness. He was tasked with creating a stateside sui- cide prevention program which served as a quick reac- tionary force to suicidal and homicidal incidents occur- ring within the Army Reserve Medical Department. His company was also tasked with a mission to provide on- site suicide prevention training across the United States to units in need. After his tenure of company command, Dr. Arthur was promoted to the rank of Captain and ap- pointed as the operations officer for the 307th Medical Brigade in Columbus, Ohio. Dr. Arthur left the service in June 2012 to pursue a PhD in Rehabilitation Science at the University of Florida. He served as a Research Assistant at CINDRR and as a National Institute on Aging Pre-Doctoral Fellow. His research interests include the identification of predic- tors of caregiver strain and burden, clinical trial design, standardized assessment design, and provider and re- searcher safety. With support provided by the Social Se- curity Administration, Dr. Arthur is currently working on a research project that will link the ICF-Activity Measure with job titles in the Dictionary of Occupational Titles and the Bob Graham Center for Public Service. He is a published author, with articles in BMC Geriatrics and Occupational Therapy in Mental Health. Paul B. Arthur, PhD, OTR/L, OTA Florida Veteran Health Heroes 4