Staff Bio
Karen Remley, MD, MBA, MPH, FAAP
National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities (NCBDDD)
Role at CDC
Karen Remley is the director for the National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities (NCBDDD). She has more than 30 years of experience in public health and health care, with leadership roles in the public and private sectors. Her "north star" has always been children and families, and she has shaped her career around helping every family have the best opportunity for health and well-being.
Previous experience
Prior to joining NCBDDD, Dr. Remley served as senior advisor to the COVID-19 response for the Office of the Commissioner, Virginia Department of Health, where she was instrumental in increasing and assuring testing for COVID-19 to ensure it was widely available across the Commonwealth of Virginia. She also worked as a professor of pediatrics at Eastern Virginia Medical School. Dr. Remley has served on many national committees and commissions working on public health education, health equity, and patient safety, including her roles as chief executive officer of the American Academy of Pediatrics; commissioner of health for the Commonwealth of Virginia under two governors; chief medical director of Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield Virginia; and chief executive officer of Physicians for Peace. In 2018, she served as the inaugural senior fellow at the de Beaumont Foundation, a foundation dedicated to pragmatic solutions to improve public health.
Education
Dr. Remley earned an MBA from the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University, an MPH at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and her MD from University of Missouri in Kansas City. She completed her pediatrics residency at St. Louis Children’s Hospital-Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.