Jennifer Trilk, PhD, is a Professor at the University of South Carolina School of Medicine Greenville and Director of the Lifestyle Medicine Core Curriculum which comprehensively trains medical students in nutrition, physical activity/exercise, behavior change, student/patient self-care, and resiliency to prevent and treat the nation’s top chronic diseases such as obesity, type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and various forms of cancer.

She also founded and directs Exercise is Medicine Greenville®, a comprehensive 12-week medically-based exercise and lifestyle program for adults with chronic health conditions, and for which in 2019 she received the Exercise is Medicine Global Leadership Award from the American College of Sports Medicine. Both of these programs were recognized on September 28^th, 2022 as part of the White House’s national strategy for their Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health.   

In 2017, she presented the rationale for Lifestyle Medicine training in medical school at a congressional briefing on Capitol Hill in conjunction with the American College of Preventive Medicine, was awarded her first U.S. President’s Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition Community Leadership Award in 2014, and in 2013 was an invited speaker for the Bipartisan Policy Center: “Teaching Nutrition and Physical Activity in Medical School: Training Doctors for Prevention-Oriented Care.”

Jennifer is a Fellow of the  American College of Sports Medicine, a Diplomate of the American College of Lifestyle Medicine, and a Fellow of the third class of the Aspen Global Leadership Network's Health Innovators Fellowship Program.

 

In 2012, Jennifer completed a post-doctoral research fellowship with CPARG. She says, “Working with Dr. Russ Pate and CPARG shaped my career in a way that no other person, place, or training had in my previous graduate school years.  Dr. Pate’s mentorship, as well as observing his methods in program building and leadership in both his NIH-awarded studies and the National Physical Activity Plan activities, was unparalleled training for me.”