Dr. Ann Blair Kennedy was presented the 2019 Performance Health / Massage Therapy Foundation Humanitarian Award at the American Massage Therapy Association (AMTA) 2019 National Convention in Indianapolis, IN. Dr. Kennedy became a board certified and state licensed massage therapist in 1999 and began a massage therapy practice in her small, rural community. Her time in practice stoked her interest in massage therapy research and the realization that the exclusion of massage therapists from the planning and implementation of these research studies led to less applicability to her clinical practice.

A strong desire to improve massage therapy research through stakeholder engagement led to her pursuing a Doctor of Public Health degree in Health Promotion, Education and Behavior. Her passion for stakeholder engagement in research expanded to include patients as co-investigators, which eventually led to her being the Director of the Health Sciences Center Patient Engagement Studio at Prisma Health.

Dr. Kennedy has held multiple volunteer positions within the Massage Therapy Foundation and with the American Massage Therapy Association, both within her state and nationally. She formerly served on the Massage Therapy Foundation’s board of trustees and is currently the Executive Editor/Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Therapeutic Massage and Bodywork.

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