Yetsa Tuakli

Athlete, Brainstormer, Connector, Designer, Doctor, Educator/Teacher, Event planner, Explorer, Idea generator, Scientist

Dr. Yetsa Tuakli is a board-certified Physiatrist at Harvard Medical School. She completed sub-specialty fellowship training in interventional spine and sports medicine at the Hospital for Special Surgery in Manhattan. She acquired additional board-certification in Integrative Holistic Medicine in 2014 and is the first Ghanaian national elected to the International Paralympic Committee (medical commission) in the same year. As a Physical Medicine physician, she treats patients with common orthopedic conditions such as low back pain and sports injuries, non-surgically. As an athlete, she represents the Federal Republic of Ghana in the women's long jump and is passionate about empowering youth and adults -- with and without physical and/or intellectual disabilities -- through sports. As an NIH-supported clinician-scientist, her research focuses on exercise motivation. Her goal is to get people moving MORE and moving BETTER, and to create inclusive spaces of empowerment through movement.

Social inclusion through sport. Individual, community and national empowerment through sport. Adapted sport. Getting people to move more, move better and move together.

Sport is among the world’s most powerful tools of social inclusion. As Nelson Mandela described, sport laughs in the face of discrimination, creates hope, inspires and unites with unforced ease. For persons with disabilities, especially at home in West Africa, the power of sport cannot be overstated. It can transform a woman in a wheelchair in rural Ghana with limited life potential into one of Africa’s most celebrated athletes (Ajara Mohammed, Ghana’s 2011 National Sportsperson of the Year). In so doing, sport changes the way women with disabilities are seen – and the way she sees herself. What's more, inclusive sporting environments benefit ALL participants. Empathy indices increase among able-bodied youth and athletic performance (work and effort) increases among adults. Beyond their obvious effect of humanizing persons with differences, inclusive sporting arenas make EVERYONE move more, move better and move together.

Disability Advocacy, Fitness & Nutrition, Sports - athletics