2013 ACR/ARHP Annual Meeting: Rheumatologists In the Spotlight

Q: You’re the only practicing rheumatologist in the world to head a department of ophthalmology. How did this happen?

A: Well, not by design, because I thought that I would never go into a field where I couldn’t spell the word.

When I was a fellow, which started 35 years ago, I was trying to develop a rat model of reactive arthritis … when the pathologist said to me that the rats had developed uveitis, I didn’t know the definition of that word. Uveitis refers to inflammation inside the eye, and it’s because of the rat’s disease that I’ve devoted my career to understanding eye inflammation. I am truly a doctor whose career has been under the direction of some rats.

Q: What do you want people to know about you?

A: My father was rheumatologist. I now hold a chair that is named for my dad. My dad started the division that I now head, and he did it as a volunteer. It wasn’t unusual for many medical schools, once upon a time, to not have a division of rheumatology.

My father was the first rheumatologist in the state of Oregon and built the division enough that the school went out and hired a full-time leader, and I eventually inherited the division. I think I’ve been especially fortunate to have such a role model.

Dr. Katz

ACR Distinguished Clinical Investigator Award

Jeffrey Katz, MD, MSc

Professor, Medicine and Orthopedic Surgery, Harvard Medical School; Professor, Epidemiology and Environmental Health, Harvard School of Public Health; Director, Orthopedic and Arthritis Center for Outcomes Research, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston

Background: Dr. Katz graduated from Princeton University and Yale Medical School, completed his residency at Yale–New Haven (Conn.) Hospital, and completed a rheumatology fellowship at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. Seeking training in clinical research methods, he earned a master’s degree at Harvard School of Public Health. He says the field of rheumatology appealed to him because it, “placed a great deal of emphasis on longitudinal care, and relied upon history and the physical exam more so than costly technology for assessing patients.”

He is principal investigator of the MeTeOR Trial, a multicenter, randomized controlled trial of the efficacy of arthroscopic partial meniscectomy, and principal investigator of Brigham and Women’s Multidisciplinary Clinical Research Center. Regarding MeTeOR, Dr. Katz says his research, “doesn’t tell patients what to do. Life is never that simple. But our data help to frame decisions.”