Yassmine MN Akkari, PhD

Yassmine Akkari, PhD, is a senior director within the Institute for Genomic Medicine at Nationwide Children’s Hospital. She is triple certified by the American Board of Medical Genetics and Genomics in the specialties of Clinical Cytogenetics, Clinical Molecular Genetics and PhD Medical Genetics. She earned her Bachelor of Sciences degree in Biology from the American University of Beirut and her PhD in Molecular Genetics at The Ohio State University. Following her postdoctoral research and clinical training at the Oregon Health & Sciences University (OHSU), she joined Legacy Health (LH) in Portland, Oregon as the Scientific director of Cytogenetics and Molecular Pathology. During her tenure at LH, she contributed to the successful validation of cytogenetic testing for both germline and somatic specimens, pan-cancer solid tumor next generation sequencing gene panels, and infectious disease, and directed all aspects of clinical genetics operations and workflow. In addition, she provided genetic counseling services for patients with complex genomic results in both the pediatric and prenatal clinics. She also participated in the successful accreditation of the Cytogenetics and Molecular Pathology laboratories at LH to the ISO 15189 standard focusing on the continuum of care directly connected with improved patient safety, risk mitigation and operational efficiency.

Dr. Akkari has served as the President of the Cancer Genomics Consortium (CGC), the Vice Chair of the CAP/ACMG Cytogenetics resource Committee, and the Chair of the Association of Molecular Pathology (AMP) Training and Education Committee. Currently, she is an Expert Member of the WHO Blue Books for hematopoietic and lymphoid tissues and genetic tumor syndromes, the Chair-elect of AMP’s Program Committee, and is a member of the Children’s Oncology Group Cytogenetics Committee and the ACMG Laboratory Quality Assurance Committee.

She is interested in all aspects of genomics as it pertains to disease diagnostics and therapy. This includes test development and clinical validations particularly in the setting of pediatric hematologic disease, CNS tumors and genetic predisposition syndromes.