Tabia Henry Akintobi, PhD, MPH
Professor and Chair of Community Health; Associate Dean for Community Engagement, Morehouse School of Medicine
Dr. Tabia Henry Akintobi is Professor and Chair of Community Health at Morehouse School of Medicine and a globally sought health equity champion and social behavioral scientist. She is a graduate of the University of South Florida College of Public Health, where she earned her Doctor of Philosophy in Public Health in the Department of Community and Family Health.
Dr. Henry Akintobi leads and collaborates on translational research and participatory evaluations that address health disparities and advance community and population health transformation. She serves as Principal Investigator of the Morehouse School of Medicine Prevention Research Center (PRC), the first institutionally designated center advancing community-based participatory research, competitively funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) since 1998. She also leads the Georgia Community Engaged Alliance (CEAL), funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and represents Morehouse School of Medicine as Principal Investigator, lead, or Senior Advisor for multiple federal and private grants — including the Georgia Center for Diabetes Translation Research, the Georgia Clinical and Translational Science Alliance Community Engagement Program, and the Health Equity Research for Action Coordinating Center.
An extensively published scholar, Dr. Henry Akintobi is co-author and editor of The Morehouse Model: How School of Medicine Revolutionized Community Engagement and Health Equity and Community-Centered Public Health: Strategies, Tools, and Applications for Advancing Health Equity, both published by Johns Hopkins University Press. She also co-authored the CDC–NIH co-sponsored Principles of Community Engagement Primer (2nd and 3rd Editions). Dr. Henry Akintobi is a proud member of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine Standing Committee on Advancing Science Communication.
As Associate Dean for Community Engagement, she advances Morehouse School of Medicine’s efforts to promote and strengthen effective partnerships among faculty, staff, students, community residents, government agencies, faith-based organizations, and social service institutions. She has led collaborations across education, clinical, research, practice, and policy sectors to demonstrate excellence in community health and engagement strategies — earning national recognition, including the Carnegie Designation for the Advancement of Teaching in Community Engagement and the Josiah Macy Inaugural Award for Excellence in Social Mission.
Her public health research and leadership are dedicated to advancing the art and science of community engagement. Her work focuses on community-engaged translational research science, the practice of community-based participatory research (CBPR), and building sustainable partnerships among academic institutions, community members, health departments, and policy leaders to address health disparities and their root causes. Her approach is guided by deep expertise in public health, social epidemiology, social marketing, community-based research, and evaluation.