Department of Health Regional Lab Director Wins National Award

NASHVILLE — Robyn Atkinson, PhD, has been selected as the recipient of the 2010 Emerging Leader Award by the Association of Public Health Laboratories. Atkinson is director of the Tennessee Department of Health’s Knoxville Regional Laboratory.

"We are so proud of Robyn for receiving this honor,” said Health Commissioner Susan R. Cooper, MSN, RN. “She brings great talent and dedication to her work in our lab, and we are pleased to have her use her skills to protect, promote and improve the health of Tennesseans.”

The Association of Public Health Laboratories Emerging Leader Award honors an individual whose leadership has been instrumental in one or more advances in laboratory science, practice, management, policy or education within his or her first five to 10 years in the profession.

“I am extremely honored to receive this award,” said Atkinson. “The support I have received from Laboratory Director David Smalley, Commissioner Cooper and all the staff at the Knoxville Regional Laboratory to pursue these endeavors on behalf of Tennessee has been amazing. I am humbled by this recognition and I hope to continue to represent Tennessee on a national level in the future.”

Atkinson came to TDOH from the New York Department of Health’s Wadsworth Center, where she began her career in public health in 2005 as director of clinical bacteriology. She joined the department as director of the Knoxville Regional Laboratory in 2007. Atkinson also currently serves as clinical assistant professor of pathology at the University of Tennessee Graduate School of Medicine and as adjunct instructor for the National Center for Biomedical Research and Training at Louisiana State University.

Atkinson holds a Bachelor of Science in biochemistry from Clemson University and a PhD in pathology from the University of Tennessee Health Sciences Center.

Atkinson is a member of the American Society for Microbiology and the Association of Public Health Laboratories. A strong advocate for food safety, she serves on the APHL Food Safety Committee, chairs the APHL Shiga Toxin-producing E. coli working group and is one of two APHL representatives on the Council to Improve Foodborne Outbreak Response. She also serves as a member-at-large to the Food and Drug Administration Partnership for Food Protection Coordinating Council and is a laboratory instructor for the national Epi-Ready program.