Colleagues,
It is my great pleasure to announce that Dr. Christine Pham, Professor of Medicine and of Pathology and Immunology, has been selected as the Division Chief of the Division of Rheumatology in the Department of Medicine. Dr. Pham was selected after an extensive national search and will assume the position of Division Chief effective October 1, 2018.
Dr. Pham’s research focuses on defining the role of innate and adaptive immune responses in various inflammatory processes. Through the use of several loss-of-function mutations in neutrophil proteases and complement proteins, her laboratory has determined the contribution of neutrophils and the complement system to several experimental models of inflammation, including rheumatoid arthritis, abdominal aortic aneurysm and asthma. Another research focus for Dr. Pham is to develop strategies to deliver nanomedicines to halt or reverse joint inflammation/degeneration in preclinical models of rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis.
Dr. Pham has been an esteemed member of the Washington University community for 21 years. She did her residency and internship at Barnes Hospital, followed by her fellowship in Rheumatology at Washington University School of Medicine. In addition to attending on the Rheumatology and the Medicine services at Barnes-Jewish Hospital, she is also an important clinician at the John Cochran VA. Dr. Pham has mentored many junior faculty into successful academic careers, and has served on multiple thesis committees. She has been a successful independently funded investigator over 21 years, and was recently notified that her P30 Washington University Rheumatic Diseases Research Resource-Based Center has been funded.
I am delighted that Dr. Pham has accepted the position of Division Chief of the Division of Rheumatology. Please join me in congratulating her for this accomplishment.
I would like to thank the members of the selection committee who worked very hard over many months to identify and interview many first-rate candidates. Members of the committee are: Drs. Clay Semenkovich (Chair), Yousef Abu-Amer, Matt Ciorba, Megan Cooper, Ben Humphreys, Al Kim, Robyn Klein, and Gwen Randolph.
Victoria J. Fraser, MD
Adolphus Busch Professor of Medicine
Chairman, Department of Medicine