Vivian P. Bykerk received a medical degree from McMaster University. Her postdoctoral training included internal medicine training at McMaster, a residency in internal and critical care medicine at the University of Toronto, and a fellowship in critical care medicine at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto. Dr. Bykerk also spent 2 years as a rheumatology fellow at McGill University in Montreal. Dr. Bykerk is a staff member in the Department of Rheumatology at Mount Sinai Hospital.
 
A Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, Dr. Bykerk holds key positions with several professional organizations. She currently serves as Director of the Network of Early Arthritis Researchers (NEAR) in Canada, Chair of the Canadian Rheumatology Association's Therapeutics Committee, and Co-Chair of the American College of Rheumatology/European League Against Rheumatism (ACR/EULAR) task force to define the best strategies for identifying patients with new-onset arthritis. She is a member of the Outcome Measures in Rheumatology (OMERACT) Biomarker Research group and the OMERACT Research group defining flare in rheumatoid arthritis, and she recently participated as a member of the ACR/EULAR task force to update the classification criteria for rheumatoid arthritis.
 

Dr. Bykerk has coauthored several papers appearing in the peer-reviewed clinical literature. In her clinical practice, Dr. Bykerk has focused on early inflammatory arthritis and rheumatoid arthritis. Her research interests include identifying predictors and best practices for improving outcomes in patients with new-onset rheumatoid arthritis.

David S. Kountz earned a medical degree at the State University of New York in Buffalo and a master of business administration at Georgian Court University in Lakewood, New Jersey. His postdoctoral training included house staff training in internal medicine at Hahnemann University Hospital in Philadelphia. In addition to his positions with Jersey Shore University Medical Center and Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, Dr. Kountz is also a Senior Fellow in the School of Population Health, Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia, Pennyslvania.

Dr. Kountz serves as Vice President of the International Society on Hypertension in Blacks (ISHIB) and a member of their Board of Trustees. In 2002, he was named a Master Educator by the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. Also included among Dr. Kountz's honors are the Friends' Health Connection Francis Black Humanitarian Award in Healthcare (2000) and an Award of Honor from Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital (2002). Dr. Kountz is a Fellow of the American College of Physicians.

Dr. Kountz continues to practice general internal medicine, and he has diverse clinical interests in primary care, including health literacy and health care economics, cardiovascular risk in minority populations, and rheumatoid arthritis. He was funded continuously by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention from 1998 to 2006 to study the management of diabetes in managed care in the Translating Research into Action in Diabetes (TRIAD) study. Dr. Kountz co-authored a consensus statement for the management of hypertension in African American patients, which was published in the journal Hypertension in November 2010.

Lauren G. Collins completed a medical degree at Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia. She completed a family medicine residency and geriatric medicine fellowship at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital.

Dr. Collins is a Diplomate of the American Board of Family Medicine and has a certification of added qualification in geriatric medicine. She is a member of the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine and the American Academy of Family Physicians. She has been actively involved in Jefferson Medical College's Committee on Professionalism and the Department's Patient Education Committee. Among her honors and awards, Dr. Collins has been recognized for her work in Interprofessional Education, and she is a past recipient of the American Academy of Family Physicians' Award for Excellence in Graduate Medical Education.

Dr. Collins has published several articles in the peer-reviewed literature, including such journals as Academic Medicine, Medical Education, Patient Education and Counseling, and American Family Physician, and her work has also been published on the MedEd Portal. Additionally, Dr. Collins has authored several textbook chapters for Primary Care: Clinics in Office Practice and Reichel's Care for the Elderly.

Clifton O. Bingham completed a medical degree at Columbia University in New York, where he also completed a residency in internal medicine. He trained as a fellow in rheumatology and allergy/clinical immunology at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston. He subsequently served as attending rheumatologist and allergist/immunologist at Brigham and Women's Hospital and Massachusetts General Hospital. He was recruited to join the faculty at NYU Hospital for Joint Diseases in 1999, where he directed the rheumatology clinic at Bellevue Hospital Center. At NYU he founded and directed the Seligman Center for Advanced Therapeutics, a pioneering center that incorporated cutting-edge clinical therapeutics with clinical trials and translational research in rheumatology. In 2005, Dr. Bingham was recruited to join the faculty at Johns Hopkins University where he now is an Associate Professor and Director of the Johns Hopkins Arthritis Center.

Dr. Bingham currently serves as a member of the Executive Committee for the international Outcome Measures in Rheumatology Clinical Trials (OMERACT) group, and he chairs workstreams developing a standardized definition of disease flares in rheumatoid arthritis and evaluating the efficacy and safety of intraarticular agents, including gene therapy. He has been active in American College of Rheumatology and Arthritis Foundation committees and has chaired meetings, study groups, and grant review sections.

Dr. Bingham has served as an investigator for several clinical trials of agents in early to late phases of development for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis. This includes service as lead investigator for the largest international study to date of a disease-modifying drug for osteoarthritis (KOSTAR), the National Institutes of Health–sponsored Glucosamine Arthritis Interventional Trial (GAIT), and a controlled study of immunization responses in patients treated with rituximab (SIERRA). Dr. Bingham has served as lead investigator in more than 35 additional clinical trials for rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis, and other autoimmune diseases. His current research program focuses on oral health in inflammatory arthritis, risk factors for osteoarthritis progression, and defining clinical and biochemical disease phenotypes related to therapeutic responses in rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis. He was recently awarded an American College of Rheumatology "Within Our Reach" grant to study Periodontal Disease in patients with rheumatoid arthritis. He is a Co-Editor for Arthritis and Rheumatism and a regular reviewer for several leading rheumatology journals, and he was formerly Associate Editor for Clinical Care in the Rheumatic Diseases. He has authored more than 55 original articles, reviews, and editorials, 10 book chapters, several topics in UpToDate in Medicine, and more than 70 abstracts.

Joyce P. Carlone earned a master of nursing degree in primary care and education from the University of California, Los Angeles. She is certified as a family nurse practitioner by the American Nurses Credentialing Center and as a clinical research coordinator by the Association of Clinical Research Professionals.

Ms. Carlone is a member of the Association of Rheumatology Health Professionals (ARHP) and the Association of Clinical Research Professionals (ACRP). She currently serves as the ARHP representative to the American College of Rheumatology Corporate Relations Committee. In 2009, Ms. Carlone received the Mary Nell McDonald Outstanding Service Award from the Emory University Department of Medicine.

Ms. Carlone has coauthored several articles and abstracts, and she has given a number of presentations on topics relating rheumatic disease and women's health. She works as both a nurse practitioner and research coordinator in rheumatology with a subspecialization in rheumatoid arthritis. She has been involved with the Arthritis Foundation's Arthritis Self-Management Course and has assisted in the initiation and development of the rheumatology division's clinical research program, Early Arthritis clinic, low-literacy education materials, and clinical assessment tools and protocols. She also is adjunct faculty in the Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing at Emory University and teaches rheumatic disease management to nurse practitioner students.

Mary Suzanne Cleveland completed a law degree at the University of Kansas School of Law. Mrs. Cleveland currently serves as Senior Analyst at the Kansas Health Institute (KHI), where she conducts and analyzes research on health care systems and access issues and monitors state and federal legislative activity related to health care. She is currently developing and leading KHI's health reform work portfolio and serving as Project Director for the Legislative Health Academy, an intensive educational and experiential course for a select group of Kansas legislators.

In addition to these posts, Mrs. Cleveland has been involved in the Patient Partner program at the University of Kansas School of Medicine for over 15 years. The Patient Partner program utilizes trained and certified rheumatoid arthritis patients to instruct medical school students and health care professionals in the identification of early signs and symptoms of arthritis. The program also serves as an opportunity for students and providers to interact with patients in a nonclinical setting to determine effective solutions to difficult doctor-patient relationship challenges such as communication and compliance. Prior to assuming her current positions with KHI, Mrs. Cleveland worked in patient advocacy and education, health law, and disability policy at the Arthritis Foundation and the Beach Center on Disability in Lawrence, Kansas. She is still an active volunteer at the Arthritis Foundation.
 

Mrs. Cleveland has coauthored several peer-reviewed journal articles and a book chapter on disability policy, and she authored issue briefs on federal and state health policy matters.