About the Newborn Screening Awards​​​

​​​​​George ​​Cunningham​​ Visionary Award in Newborn Screening

​The George Cunningham Visionary Award in Newborn Screening honors a person working in US newborn screening as judged by the Awards Selection Committee to have made the greatest contribution to expanding or improving the screening of newborns by public health agencies in one or more states. The contribution of the recipient must have had a direct effect in improving the quality of life of newborns and their families. The award will be for lifetime achievements.

Harry Hannon Laboratory Improvement Award in Newborn Screening

The Harry Hannon Laboratory Improvement Award in Newborn Screening honors a person working in newborn screening worldwide as judged by the Awards Selection Committee to have made significant contributions in one or more of the following areas: assuring the quality of testing, enhancing the specificity of tests, establishing new creative laboratory approaches and technologies, providing laboratory training/education for new technologies and tests, or improving the detection of newborn disorders/conditions. The contributions of the recipient must have had a direct effect in improving the quality of laboratory results for the newborn screening system. The award will be for lifetime achievements.​

Judi Tuerck Newborn Screening Follow-up and Education Award

The Judi Tuerck Newborn Screening Follow-up and Education Award honors a person working in newborn screening worldwide as judged by the Awards Selection Committee to have made significant and outstanding contributions in one or more of the following areas: enhancing the caliber of the newborn screening system; improving follow-up and education; developing creative short term follow-up strategies that significantly reduce the time to diagnosis and treatment of affected infants; developing or enhancing long term follow-up strategies; establishing novel approaches or methods for managing the integration of new technologies in newborn screening; translating novel approaches or methods into best practices or guidelines for follow-up and education; providing innovative newborn screening follow-up training/education for best practices; or improving practices to ensure timely detection, reporting, intervention and treatment for newborns detected with disorders/conditions. The contributions of the proposed recipient must have had a direct impact on improving the quality of follow-up and education for the newborn screening system. The award will be for lifetime achievements.

​Everyday Life Saver A​​​ward

The Everyday Life Saver Award in Newborn Screening honors a person working in newborn screening as judged by the Awards Selection Committee to have made meaningful and significant contributions to their newborn screening program. The intent of this award is to highlight the meaningful, ongoing ways the recipient contributes to the morale of their team and/or operations of their program on a daily basis. The recipient of this award may be early in their career, working part-time post-retirement, or mid-career. Candidates are not required to have lifelong experience or tenure with a program to be considered.

The Clinician Champion Award

The Clinician Champion Award honors someone involved in patient care and who has made significant contributions in one or more of the following areas: ensuring newborns receive adequate screening and appropriate follow-up; assuring timely and effective communication of screening results to patients and families; and contributing to efforts to strengthen the impact of the public health newborn screening system by being directly involved in follow-up care, community affairs, newborn screening advocacy and/or community activities.

The Achievements in Public Health Informatics Award

The Achievements in Public Health Informatics Award honors a person working in any aspect of newborn screening worldwide and has made significant contributions in one or more of the following areas: enhancing implementation practices for electronic messaging; developing strategies for achieving effective data management; improving laboratory capability for health information data exchange; or providing new and creative approaches to communicate findings through data visualization.

Award Recipients

​​​​​George ​​Cunningham​​ Visionary Award in Newborn Screening

  • 2023: Rachel Lee, PhD

  • 2022: Sylvia Mann, MS, CGC

  • 2021: C. Ronald Scott, MD   

  • 2019:​ Ming Chan, PhD

  • 2017: Jeffrey Botkin, MD, MPH

  • 2016:
    • ​Stanton Berberich, PhD

    • Michael Glass, MS​​​

  • ​2014: Fred Lorey, PhD​​

  • 2013: Philip Farrell, MD, PhD

​Harry Hannon Laboratory Improvement Award in Newborn Screening

  • 2023: Patrick Hopkins

  • 2022: Andreas Rohrwasser, PhD, MBA

  • 2021:​ Roger B. Eaton, PhD

  • 2019: Victor Skrinska, PhD, DABCC

  • 2017: Joseph Orsini, PhD

  • ​2016: Michele Caggana, ScD, FACMG​

  • 2014: Mei W. Baker, MD, FACMG

  • ​​​2013: Anne Marie Comeau, PhD

​​Judi Tuerc​k Newborn Screening Follow-up and Education Award

  • 2023: Carol Johnson

  • 2022: Natasha F. Bonhomme

  • 2021:​​ Cy​​​nthia L. Ingham, RN, BSN

  • 20​​1​9:

    • Barbara Ferreira, BSN

    • Lisa Feuchtbaum, DrPH, MPH​

    • Amy Gavigli​o, MS, CGC

  • 2017: Thali​​​a Wood, MPH​

  • 2014: Julie Luedtke

​​​Everyday Life Saver Award

  • 2023:

    • Ron Hardy 

    • Kimberly Blake

  • 2022: Mei W. Baker, MD

  • 2021: ​ M. Christine Dorley, PhD MT(ASCP)​

  • 2019: Krystal Baumert

The Clinician Champion Award 

  • 2023:

    • Phillip Farrell, MD, PhD

    • Paul Levy, MD

  • 2022: Susan A. Berry, MD

The Achievements in Public Health Informatics Award 

  • 2023: Craig Newman, PhD

  • 2022: Brendan Reilly

Learn More

Information about upcoming awards nominations will be sent out via the listservs at the start of the symposium planning season. For more information​ please email Dara Slavin at dara.slavin@aphl.org. ​​