National Staff
Mary C. Kasch, OTR/L, CHT, FAOTA
Executive Director
Mary Kasch was appointed Executive Director by the Board of Directors of the Hand Therapy Certification Commission in April 2000. As the chief of operations for the commission, Mary moved from her role as President to oversee the day-to-day business of the commission. Mary brings to this new role over eighteen years of experience in the field of certification, twenty-seven years of experience in association leadership experience and more than twenty-five years of clinical practice as a hand therapist. A recipient of many awards for leadership, she was honored by the American Society of Hand Therapists as the 1991 recipient of the Natalie Barr Lectureship for outstanding contributions to the field of hand therapy. She also received the Lillian D. Terris Award for Distinguished Board Service from Professional Examination Service in 1996. Few certification organizations are blessed with an executive director that brings together this combination of certification experience combined with a love and passion for the professional group they certify.

Mary has been involved in the growth of the hand therapy profession from the beginning. In 1975, when a group of six occupational and physical therapists had a vision for starting an organization of hand therapists, Mary was there and became one of the founding members of the American Society of Hand Therapists. It was during her presidential year (1983), that the association held its first continuing education course. Seventeen years ago when a small group of hand therapists had a vision for a certification in hand therapy, Mary was one of those that made it happen. When the Hand Therapy Certification Commission had the vision to become a not-for-profit corporation in 1989, Mary was there to serve as the first President and served as President for the first ten years of the commission.

Mary was also one of the first to manage a hand therapy clinic. In 1974, Dr. Richard Petzoldt, a new hand surgeon in San Jose, had a vision for starting a hand surgery practice, and Mary had the vision for a hand therapy clinic. She was there to start and manage the hand therapy clinic that later became his memorial clinic and which is now run by Dr. Petzoldt’s son Tom, also an OTR. Always involved and always there for hand therapists, Mary brings to the commission a wealth of ideas and visions for shaping the future of certification in hand therapy and a record of accomplishments that prove she can make things happen.