Robert Huggins, PhD, ATC
President of Occupational Safety & Athlete Performance
Director, Atlas Project
Dr. Robert Huggins is currently the President of Occupational Safety and Athlete Performance at the Korey Stringer Institute. He is also an Assistant Professor in the Department of Kinesiology at the University of Connecticut. Dr. Huggins oversees the operations of the Athlete Performance Testing division of KSI and the Heat Safety Performance Coalition (HSPC) which strives to protect occupational laborers and workers from the dangerous effects of acute and chronic heat exposure. Dr. Huggins is the director of the Athletic Training Locations and Services (ATLAS) Project which keeps track of the level of AT services in over 21,000 secondary schools in the U.S. since 2015.
Dr. Huggins focuses on two major areas of research, 1) athlete/laborer health, safety, and performance and 2) the access and provision of Athletic Training Services to secondary schools. In athletes and laborers, his research interests include the heat illness prevention, thermoregulation, hydration, and monitoring training load/workload and physiological biomarkers for the prevention of injury/illness. Related to AT services, his research focuses on improving the delivery of AT services at the secondary school level, emergency best practices in youth athletes, and the economic impact of medical services rendered by ATs. Dr. Huggins has been a lead or co-author on ~70 publications) and has delivered ~80 professional presentations throughout the US. His work can be found here (Research Gate and Google Scholar)
Dr. Huggins has provided heat safety policy and risk mitigation services/expertise to the airline, food, construction, manufacturing, and postal delivery service industries. He has provided expert advice and services to the US Soccer Women’s National Team, Olympians in several sports, professional endurance athletes, and football players. Dr. Huggins also has a great deal of experience at mass medical events such as the Falmouth Road Race, Boston Marathon, and Marine Corps Marathon where he has treated more than 80 cases of exertional heat stroke. Dr. Huggins is a licensed Athletic Trainer since 2007 and received his bachelor’s degree in Athletic Training from the University of Connecticut in 2007, his master’s degree in Athletic Training from the University of Virginia in 2008, his doctoral degree from the University of Connecticut in 2014 and completed a post-doctoral fellowship at UConn from 2014-2017.
Dr. Huggins was an editor of the book entitled “Elite Soccer Players: Maximizing Performance and Safety” and has written chapters on Technology in the book “Sport and Physical Activity in the Heat” and two chapters in “Quick Questions in Heat-Related Illness and Hydration”. He was lead author on the 2013 “Inter-Association Task Force for Preventing Sudden Death in Secondary School Athletics Programs: Best Practices Recommendations.”
Dr. Huggins serves as the co-chair of the College of Agriculture, Health and Natural Resources (CAHNR) Advancing Adaptation and Resilience in a Changing Climate Strategic Vision Implementation Committee and as a member of the CANHR Commencement Committee. Dr. Huggins also is the current co-chair of the New England American College of Sports Medicine (NEACSM) Free Communications Committee. Previously he served on the NATA Committee on Professional Ethics, the 2017-2018 NATA Appropriate Medical Care For the Secondary School Aged Athlete Task Force, co-chair of the 2016 Youth Sports Safety Governing Bodies Meeting and member of the organizing committee and speaker for the 2016 Collaborative Solutions for Safety in Sport Meeting.
