V-FIT Speaker Bios

Dr. Nadera Sweiss is a rheumatologist and Professor of Medicine at the University of Illinois College of Medicine. Dr. Sweiss's research efforts focus on translational sarcoidosis. Her goal is to bridge basic science and clinical research to provide the best care for patients.

Dr. Saad is Board Certified in General Pediatrics and Pediatric Rheumatology. She received her MD degree from Weill Cornell Medical College in Qatar in 2014. She completed her residency in Pediatrics at Wright State University in 2017. Dr. Saad completed her fellowship in Pediatric Rheumatology in 2020 at the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York.

Dr. Saad has an interest in auto-inflammatory disorders, particularly in periodic fever syndromes. She is involved in the auto-inflammatory group through the Childhood Arthritis and Rheumatology Research Alliance (CARRA), as well as in the North American Immuno-Hematology Clinical Education and Research (NICER) Consortium. Dr. Saad is currently working on a multi-center, international study to validate a disease activity measure in PFAPA.

Dr. Najia Shakoor, MD is a Rheumatology Specialist in Chicago, IL and has over 25 years of experience in the medical field. Dr. Shakoor has extensive experience in Osteoporosis & Screening. She graduated from Northeastern Ohio University in 1997. She is affiliated with Rush University Medical Center.

Dr. Patel (previously Dr. Serling-Boyd) completed her undergraduate and medical education at the University of California, Los Angeles. She then completed her Internal Medicine residency and chief residency at Stanford and her rheumatology fellowship at Massachusetts General Hospital. Her research interests include vasculitis and quantifying and reducing glucocorticoid toxicity. Her current projects are focused on better quantifying glucocorticoid toxicity and its associations with quality of life and healthcare resource utilization in rheumatic diseases, evaluating the outcomes of patients with rheumatic diseases and COVID-19, and evaluating changes in metabolic parameters in the setting of chronic glucocorticoid use.

Dr. Natasha Ruth is currently the Division Director of Pediatric Rheumatology at the Medical University of South Carolina where she also serves as the Fellowship Director. Her research interest is in pediatric lupus. She is recognized for establishing a partnership with pediatric nephrology and integrating their expertise into the pediatric lupus nephritis working group of the Childhood Arthritis Rheumatology Research Alliance. Dr. Ruth is also currently the Co-Director for the Program on Physician Well-Being at the Medical University of South Carolina where she utilizes qualitative research techniques to develop evidence-based approaches to prevent burnout and improve physician well-being.

Nisha Acharya is the Director of the Uveitis and Ocular Inflammatory Disease Service and the Uveitis Fellowship at the F.I. Proctor Foundation. Her clinical expertise is the diagnosis and management of patients with infectious and inflammatory eye diseases. She is experienced with the latest treatments for uveitis, including treatment with new immunomodulatory drugs and biologic therapies. Dr. Acharya’s research focuses on the design and implementation of clinical trials to determine the optimal treatment for these conditions. Current projects include clinical trials comparing treatments for uveitis and uveitic-macular edema, and epidemiological studies on ocular inflammatory diseases.