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Contact Details

Phone
+64 3 479 3485
Email
carrie.falling@otago.ac.nz

University Links

Position
Lecturer
Qualifications
PhD
Research summary
Care of people living with persistent pain, and evidence-based physiotherapy education
Teaching
Carrie has been involved in physiotherapy teaching since 2016, including undergraduate and postgraduate education, as well as clinical supervision, laboratory, tutorial, and lecture teaching environments.
Memberships
  • New Zealand Registered Physiotherapist
  • New Zealand Pain Society
  • International Association for the Study of Pain (IASP)
  • Pain at Otago Research Theme Steering Committee member and Early Career Representative
  • University of Otago Division of Health Sciences Early and Mid-Career Research (EMCR) Group
  • New Zealand Federation of Graduate Women
  • Collaboration of Ageing Research Excellence (CARE)
    • Clinical
    Carrie’s background is in primary care physiotherapy, most commonly supporting people with long-term health challenges

    Research

    Carrie’s research focuses on improving care for people living with chronic pain and advancing evidence-based physiotherapy education through innovative assessment and learning approaches.

    Chronic Overlapping Pain Conditions (COPCs) Programme

    This stream of research is focused on exploring COPCs, such as temporomandibular disorders, irritable bowel syndrome, and fibromyalgia. This research is particularly interested in the development of equitable health services that reflect best-practice recommendations for care:
    Research programme: Chronic overlapping pain conditions web page

    Clinical Assessment of Pain (CAP) Programme

    This research stream is focused on exploring novel methods of assessing and analysing painful experiences using routinely collected data in conditions such as inflammatory bowel disease, colorectal cancer, and surgical populations. This includes the use of bedside assessments (i.e. quantitative sensory testing) to examine potential mechanisms of pain as well as the use of developmental trajectories and machine learning applications to predict patient outcomes:
    Clinical assessment of pain webpage

    Generative Artificial Intelligence in Physiotherapy Education Programme

    This research stream focuses on the use of generative artificial intelligence (AI) in undergraduate physiotherapy education. The programme explores how AI-based tools can support the development of clinical reasoning, communication, and patient assessment skills, particularly in the context of subjective assessment and complex clinical decision-making.

    This research is concerned with pedagogically sound, ethical, and equitable integration of AI into health professional education. Areas of interest include students’ perceptions and experiences of using generative AI, the impact of AI-supported learning on skill development and confidence, and the implications of AI use for assessment, feedback, and professional identity formation in physiotherapy education.

    Publications

    Overton, M., Falling, C., Swain, N., Gwynne-Jones, D., Fillingim, R., & Mani, R. (2025, October). Experiences of using smartphone ecological momentary assessment for reporting knee osteoarthritis pain and symptoms. Verbal presentation at the Australian Physiotherapy Association Scientific Conference (APASC): Lead the Physiotherapy Evolution, Adelaide, Australia. Conference Contribution - Verbal presentation and other Conference outputs

    Overton, M., Swain, N., Falling, C., Gwynne-Jones, D., Fillingim, R., & Mani, R. (2024). Understanding the biopsychosocial knee osteoarthritis pain experience: An ecological momentary assessment. PAIN Reports, 9(4), e1172. doi: 10.1097/PR9.0000000000001172 Journal - Research Article

    Shemmell, J., Falling, C., Mackinnon, C. D., Stapley, P. J., Ribeiro, D. C., & Stinear, J. W. (2024). Different descending pathways mediate early and late portions of lower limb responses to transcranial magnetic stimulation. Journal of Neurophysiology, 131, 1299-1310. doi: 10.1152/jn.00153.2023 Journal - Research Article

    Overton, M., Swain, N., Falling, C., Gwynne-Jones, D., Fillingim, R., & Mani, R. (2024). Does sensitisation predict the variable knee osteoarthritis pain experience? [Invited]. Proceedings of the New Zealand Pain Society (NZPS) Annual Scientific Meeting: Empowering Pain Management in New Zealand. Retrieved from https://www.nzps2024.nz/ Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Abstract

    Davidson, L., Calder, A., & Falling, C. (2024). It's a total pain in the mouth! Physiotherapists' perspectives of temporomandibular disorders [Invited]. Proceedings of the New Zealand Pain Society (NZPS) Annual Scientific Meeting: Empowering Pain Management in New Zealand. Retrieved from https://www.nzps2024.nz/ Conference Contribution - Published proceedings: Abstract

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