ErgoScience

Deborah Lechner
President, PT,MS

Deborah graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with her BS in Physical Therapy and later received her post‐professional masters from the Massachusetts General Institute in Boston. Lechner is founder and President of ErgoScience, Inc.

From 1988 to 1993, she developed and validated a state of the art FCE, the Physical Work Performance Evaluation (PWPE), as part of her research responsibilities as a Research Associate professor with the Department of Occupational and Environmental Medicine at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). When the results of the research were found positive, the University of Alabama at Birmingham Research Foundation encouraged her to market the evaluation. ErgoScience® was then formed to commercialize the service.

Lechner brings to the FCE process a solid grounding in biomechanics and kinesiology from her experience with computerized gait analysis and instruction in kinesiology. Another powerful influence on her approach to FCE development was her graduate training at the Massachusetts General Institute. The program emphasized standardization, objectivity, reliability and validity in clinical measurement. In the PWPE, as with other ErgoScience® products and courses, she combines her research background with 25+ years of clinical experience. She has also developed a quantitative job demands analysis process that was analyzed and tested in conjunction with the US Department of Labor in 2002. She has assisted her faculty in developing coursework in industrial rehabilitation and AMA impairment ratings, and has developed programs to help clinics market their rehabilitation services. Deborah has published her work and literature reviews in national and international journals and has conducted numerous workshops on functional capacity evaluations, job demands analysis and industrial rehabilitation practices.

Deborah has also led the growth of ErgoScience’s business internationally by providing services in 11 countries, including 49 states in the U.S. There are over 850 clinics providing the PWPE domestically and internationally in Germany, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Thailand, Indonesia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Nigeria and Israel. Under her leadership, ErgoScience® continues to provide both a clinical and a research focus in its product development, delivery, and customer service.