Functional Movement Disorder Collective
About the Karma Project
This pilot program with the Functional Movement Disorder (FMD) Interdisciplinary Clinic of NYC, is providing group interdisciplinary rehabilitation for people with FMD who are unable to access treatment. The clinic is providing in-person yoga classes, virtual physical therapy, and virtual cognitive behavioral therapy-informed psycho-education for ten people with FMD, at no-cost to the participants.
As a multifaceted disease, people living with FMD often face barriers to effective treatment including a lack of access to specialized clinicians, a lack of financial resources, disease stigma resulting from societal prejudices and a lack of provider/therapist education. Additionally, each participant will receive three one-on-one 30- minute consultations with the clinic’s neurologist.
Learn more about FMD and yoga as a treatment.
Meet the Karma Project Creators
Z Paige L'Erario (MD, LMSW, Clinic Psychotherapist), pictured left, is a board-certified neurologist and psychotherapist, specializing in the treatment of Functional Neurological Disorder. Dr. L'Erario received their medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine and their Master of Social Work from Fordham University Graduate School of Social Service. Additionally, Dr. L'Erario completed their neurology training at New York-Presbyterian Hospital Weill Cornell Medical Center. Their clinical and research interests are working with LGBTQ+ people living with Functional Neurological Disorder. Dr. L'Erario facilitates the nation's first LGBTQ+ support group at FND Hope, and their work regarding LGBTQ+ healthcare has been presented at major international conferences and published in Scientific American, Psychiatric Times, and the Journal of Child Neurology, among others.
Zachary Grin (DPT, Clinic Physical Therapist), pictured center left, is a physical therapist who provides evidence-based outpatient physical therapy services to patients living with various Functional Neurological Disorders. During his time working as a physical therapist for a large hospital system, he frequently encountered people with Functional Neurological Disorder receiving poor medical management and treatment options, leading him to open his own private practice dedicated to people living with this complex health condition. He is also an international speaker providing hospital systems, clinicians, and students with the knowledge needed to treat and support people living with Functional Neurological Disorder.
Christian Amlang (MD, Clinic Neurologist), pictured center right, is movement disorders neurologist at SUNY Downstate. He has conducted research on neuropsychiatric symptoms and neurophysiologic changes in a variety of movement disorders, studying emotional processing in Huntington’s disease, visuo-spatial perception in cervical dystonia, and reward-based learning and risk behavior in cerebellar ataxia. Clinically, he has treated a large number of individuals with Functional Neurological Disorder. He has witnessed firsthand that most patients cannot be adequately treated which leads to chronification and frequently worsening of symptoms. Therefore, he believes the mission of the FMD Interdisciplinary Clinic is crucial to improving FMD patient outcomes.
Danielle Kipnis (MA, CYI-200, Clinic Yoga Instructor), pictured right, is a yoga instructor and PhD student in kinesiology at Teachers College, Columbia University. Her work focuses on integrative movement therapies for individuals with Functional Neurological Disorder. Through training in trauma-informed yoga practices, she has implemented methods of yoga instruction for people with neurological conditions and her research is the first to examine yoga as a rehabilitative treatment for people with Functional Neurological Disorder. She aims to describe and codify these methods through research, implement them in clinical practice, and train other yoga instructors in the methodology who are in the neurorehabilitation field.