Dr. Amy Becklenberg, DNP, APRN, FNP-BC, DipACLM, FAANP, is an Associate Clinical Professor at the Emory School of Nursing. Throughout her 28-year nursing career, Dr. Becklenberg has worked in a broad array of settings, most of which have included underserved populations. She is passionate about ensuring that both pre-licensure and post-licensure nursing students are prepared to assess and address the Social and Structural Determinants of Health of patients and communities, for enhanced prevention of chronic diseases and overall wellness.

She has worked in primary care settings both in the US and abroad and she has been involved with service-learning health care experiences in rural Nicaragua, Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Her first nursing position was as the “Migrant Farmworker Outreach Nurse” in central Indiana. She then worked with "Doctors Without Borders" in a large refugee camp in Zambia. Upon her return, she worked for 4.5 years in a large Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC)in Chicago, primarily with new immigrants who spoke Spanish only. While there, she developed a group visit program for pediatric patients who were overweight or obese.

Dr. Becklenberg completed a Doctor of Nursing Practice degree at Georgia State University, a Master of Science in Nursing at the University of Illinois at Chicago and a Bachelor of Science in Nursing at the Indiana University School of Nursing.

Her research and scholarship has included customization of the “Talk With Me Baby” (TWMB) early language and literacy initiative, which was jointly created and managed by a collaborative of Atlanta based institutions. Dr. Becklenberg’s work made the TWMB package of neurocognitive interventions more accessible to non-native English-speaking parents in community contexts as well as in NICU and KMC settings in Ethiopia.  Dr. Becklenberg is board certified by the American College of Lifestyle Medicine. Her teaching and research have focused on the integration of Lifestyle Medicine into health care professional training for more effective prevention, treatment and at times, reversal of chronic disease, especially in communities and populations experiencing health disparities.

‍

• Leppke, A. & Becklenberg, A. (2025). Innovative methods for building lifestyle medicine knowledge and skills in student clinician education: A multimodal approach. American Journal of Lifestyle Medicine. https://doi. org.proxy.library.emory.edu/10.1177/15598276251359802
• Abiri, A., Starks, S., Leppke, A., Woodbury, V., McFarland, M., Vohra-Khullar, P., & Becklenberg, A. (2024). Incorporating social needs screening in simulation for family nurse practitioner students. Journal of Nursing Education, 0(0), 1–4. https://doi.org/10.3928/01484834-20240521-01
• Becklenberg, A., Downes, E., Saavedra, M.B., & Abiri, A. (2023). The integration of social determinants of health into the advanced health assessment for APRN Students. In J. Hamilton, B.A. Swan & L. McCauley (Ed.), Integrating a social determinant of health framework into nursing education (1st ed.). Manhattan: Springer.
• Cook, C., Becklenberg, A., Leppke, A., Kendall, A., & Vohra-Khullar, P. (2022). Improving telehealth education and competency for students (ITECS). Nursing Economic$, 40(5), 230– 236.
• Cook, C., Becklenberg, A., Leppke, A., Clement, D.M., Downs, E., & Evans, D. (2021). Telehealth headache simulation for nurse practitioner students during the COVID-19 pandemic. Headache: The Journal of Head and Face Pain, 61(S1),158-159.
• Becklenberg, A., Hires, K., Darcy Mahoney, A., Baralt, M., & Stapel-Wax, J. (2021). A training to promote early language interactions among refugee mothers who are speakers of languages other than English. Journal of Cultural Diversity, 28(2), 48-55.
• Brasher, S., Becklenberg, A., Darcy Mahoney, A., Ross, K., & Stapel-Wax, J. L. (2021). Integrating early brain science and skills into prelicensure nursing curriculum to promote parent-child interaction. Nurse Educator, 46(4), E75–E78. https://doi.org/10.1097/NNE.0000000000000983
• Becklenberg, A., Tanner, T., Csaky, W., Reyes, I., Jeon, M., & Darcy Mahoney, A. (2020). Screening for and addressing food insecurity in the management of childhood obesity. Advances in Family Practice Nursing, 2, 201-205.
• Darcy Mahoney, A., McConnell, S., Larson, A., Becklenberg, A., & Stapel-Wax, J. (2020). Where do we go from here? Examining pediatric and population-level interventions to improve child outcomes. Early Childhood Research Quarterly. 50, 205-220. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecresq.2019.01.009
• Kouba, J., Velsor-Friedrich, B., Militello, L., Harrison, P., Becklenberg, A., White, B., Surya, S. & Ahmed, A. (2012). Efficacy of the I Can Control Asthma and Nutrition Now (ICAN) Pilot Program on Health Outcomes in High School Students with Asthma. Journal of School Nursing. 29(3), 235-247.
• Riner, M. & Becklenberg, A. (2001). Partnering with a Sister City Organization for an International Service-Learning Experience. Journal of Transcultural Nursing 12(3), 234-240.