Children’s Hospital Lab Director Credits ARUP for Her Approach to Rare Disease

Laura Filkins, PhD, learned of ARUP Laboratories during her clinical microbiology lab rotation at Dartmouth College, where she was pursuing her doctoral degree. Dartmouth’s lab director emphasized the benefits of a fellowship at a national reference laboratory and pointed her in the direction of ARUP.

Laura Filkins, PhD, learned of ARUP Laboratories during her clinical microbiology lab rotation at Dartmouth College, where she was pursuing her doctoral degree. Dartmouth’s lab director emphasized the benefits of a fellowship at a national reference laboratory and pointed her in the direction of ARUP.

“The more I looked into it, the more everything it offered aligned with my goals and, particularly, my passion for test development,” said Filkins, who was an ARUP fellow from 2016 to 2018.

In 2016, Filkins aspired to be a lab director in a public health lab or a microbiology lab. Today, she is the director of the Microbiology Laboratory at Children’s Health System of Texas in Dallas. She is also an assistant professor of pathology at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center.

“The breadth of training I received at ARUP for routine as well as esoteric testing prepared me for leading a lab,” Filkins said. “We see a fair share of incredible and rare cases involving children, and my experience at ARUP helped me build a foundation for knowing how to approach those cases.”

Filkins remembers the daily rotations in different labs at ARUP and the supportive atmosphere provided by both medical directors and bench technicians. “A lot of learning came from the bench techs,” Filkins said. She rattled off a list of the labs she frequented: Bacteriology, Parasitology, Mycology, Serology, and Infectious Diseases.

The daily lab rounds were led by medical directors, including Marc Couturier, PhD; Adam Barker, PhD; Mark Fisher, PhD; Kim Hanson, MD, MHS; and Robert Schlaberg, MD, Dr Med, MPH. “They were great teachers and we had so much access to them,” Filkins recalled. Couturier is now medical director of Emerging Health Crises and Microbial Immunology, Parasitology and Fecal Testing; Barker is chief scientific officer and medical director of AFB/Mycology, Reagent Laboratory, R&D Special Operations; Fisher is medical director of Bacteriology, Special Microbiology, and Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing; Hanson is section chief of Clinical Microbiology and medical director of Mycology; and Schlaberg is medical director of Infectious Disease.

“She gave absolutely every minute to getting it right and learning,” said Couturier, who worked with Filkins on a research project. “She took the training to heart and had an incredible work ethic.”

Although Filkins now works at a children’s hospital decorated with purple walls and big butterflies, with therapy dogs walking the hallways, she still vividly recalls her first few days at ARUP in the Parasitology Lab. She was learning how to read blood smears for malaria and other bloodborne pathogens.

“I remember thinking, ‘This is so fascinating, but wait, am I also going to have to do the diagnoses?’” But after three days, Filkins had learned the basics and her comfort level was increasing. “At ARUP a lot of learning comes from being put in the lab and seeing and doing the hands-on work.”