Professor Karl Atkin

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BA (Hons) Sociology

After studying BA (Hons) Sociology at the then Birmingham Polytechnic, Karl undertook a Doctorate of Philosophy on 'The Production of Health and Social Care' at the University of York, joining them as Research Fellow in 1988. He rejoined York in 2005 after various posts at the universities of Leeds and Bradford. He now holds a personal Chair and is Deputy Head (Research) of York's Department of Health Sciences. He teaches public health to both undergraduate and postgraduate students and is the Module Leader for Qualitative Research applied to Health Service Research.

Karl is a medical sociologist with a background in doing qualitative research in multidisciplinary and culturally diverse settings. His work has a particular focus on health and social care in multicultural societies and understanding the social consequences of various long standing, chronic conditions, including sickle cell and thalassaemia disorders. This has led him to become especially interested in how medical knowledge is produced and historically grounded.

He is currently a member of the National Institute of Health, Public Health Research Board, and since 2005 has held the Chair of the Public Outreach subcommittee on behalf of the National Screening Committee (NHS) for Sickle Cell and Thalassaemia. He is a scientific advisor for the UK Thalassaemia Society and UK Thalidomide Trust and also serves as Managing Editor of Ethnicity and Health journal.