The Four Pillars of Weight Loss Save

This therapeutic update is sponsored by Lilly. 

Dr. Catherine Bakewell

Catherine Bakewell, M.D., is a rheumatologist with a clinical rheumatology focus in Salt Lake City, UT. Dr. Bakewell has 22 years of experience caring for patients with inflammatory and autoimmune conditions, including rheumatoid arthritis, psoriatic arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis, lupus, scleroderma, Sjogren syndrome, and gout. Her practice includes detailed rheumatology visits, medication management for immune-mediated disease, injection therapy, and infusion-based treatment for patients who need ongoing monitoring. She is affiliated with Intermountain Healthcare in Salt Lake City, where her work centers on evaluation and treatment of complex rheumatologic conditions.

Dr. Derin Karacabeyli

Dr. Derin Karacabeyli is a rheumatologist enrolled in the UBC Clinician Investigator Program. His undergraduate studies were in kinesiology at UBC, where he finished Head of Class in his first, second, and third years, and was awarded three Premier Undergraduate Scholarships and the distinction of Wesbrook Scholar. He developed an interest in obesity, which he continued to pursue through his Medical Doctorate and Internal Medicine Residency at UBC. He completed Rheumatology Residency at UBC in 2024.Derin is enrolled in a PhD in Experimental Medicine under the supervision of Dr. Diane Lacaille, studying the effects of treating metabolic comorbidities like obesity and type 2 diabetes on patients with immune-mediated inflammatory diseases. His goal is to establish an interdisciplinary metabolic-rheumatology clinic in order to better characterize and manage the unique needs of patients with excess adiposity and inflammatory arthritis.

Dr. Juliana Simonetti

Juliana Simonetti has joint appointments with both the departments of internal medicine and surgery and is co-directing the Comprehensive Weight Management Program at the University of Utah. Dr. Simonetti received her medical degree from the University of Utah School of Medicine in 2009 and completed her residency in Internal Medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical center and her fellowship in clinical nutrition and obesity at Boston University Medical Center. She is board certified by the American Board of Internal Medicine and the American Board of Obesity Medicine. She has been working in the field of bariatric medicine for the last 9 years and is a tremendous asset to the program in offering medical weight loss options to pre and post bariatric surgery patients as well as for any patient who would benefit from weight loss

Dr. Philip Mease

Philip J. Mease is Director of Rheumatology Research at the Swedish Medical Center/Providence St. Joseph Health and Clinical Professor at the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle, WA, USA. His clinical practice is based at Seattle Rheumatology Associates. Dr Mease earned his undergraduate and medical degrees at Stanford University (Stanford, CA, USA). He then completed his residency in internal medicine and a fellowship in rheumatology at the University of Washington School of Medicine. Dr Mease’s research interests include psoriatic arthritis (PsA) and spondyloarthritis (SpA), rheumatoid arthritis (RA), osteoarthritis (OA), fibromyalgia (FM), and osteoporosis. His research focuses on disease state, outcome measure development, and determining the efficacy and safety of emerging therapies for these conditions. His seminal 2000 Lancet paper established the efficacy of anti-tumour necrosis factor (TNF) therapy in PsA. He has authored over 550 journal articles and many hundreds of abstracts, book chapters, and edited textbooks on PsA and axial SpA (AxSpA). Dr Mease is a prolific international speaker at academic congresses, grand rounds, and other educational activities for rheumatologists and dermatologists, and is considered an international key opinion leader, researcher, educator, and clinician regarding SpA, including PsA, ankylosing spondylitis (AS), and non-radiographic SpA. He is a reviewer for multiple journals including New England Journal of Medicine, Lancet, Arthritis & Rheumatology, Arthritis Care & Research, Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases, The Journal of Rheumatology, and Seminars in Arthritis and Rheumatism. Dr Mease is Past President and Founding Organizer of the Group for Research and Assessment of Psoriasis and Psoriatic Arthritis (GRAPPA); a member of the Assessment of Spondyloarthritis international Society (ASAS), the Spondyloarthritis Research and Treatment Network (SPARTAN), and The Rheumatology Education Group (TREG); and Past President of the Northwest Rheumatism Society. He has also been active in the Outcome Measures in Rheumatology (OMERACT) research organization as Co-Chair of the PsA and chronic pain working groups and as a member of the steering committee. Dr Mease is an active mentor of young investigators in these organizations. He serves in an educational and advisory role for the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and is a member of the steering committee of the arthritis section of the International Consortium for Health Outcomes Measurement (ICHOM). He conducts disease state research in registries such as the Consortium of Rheumatology Researchers of North America (CorEvitas/Corrona), for which he is Director of the PsA–SpA arm. Dr Mease is a Master of the American College of Rheumatology (ACR) and has received its Medical Communicator of the Year Award for his teaching there and in the community. He is a Co-Chair of the ACR abstract review committee section on SpA and PsA and serves on the Voting Committee for the ACR-NPF (National Psoriasis Foundation) Psoriatic Arthritis treatment guidelines task force. He is also Co-Chair of the PsA task force of the NPF, which in 2019 awarded him a lifetime achievement award for his work in advancing the field of PsA. Expertscape ranks Dr Mease as the most published worldwide expert in PsA and the 24th most published in AxSpA in the past decade.

Dr. Elena Philippou

Dr. Elena Philippou, PhD, RD, is a Registered Dietitian and an Associate Professor at the University of Nicosia, Cyprus. In parallel, she holds the positions of Visiting Senior Lecturer at King's College London, UK, and Adjunct Associate Professor at RMIT University, Australia. With over 20 years of clinical experience, she specializes in the Mediterranean diet, low Glycaemic Index (GI) diet, Chrononutrition (including intermittent fasting), and the dietary management of metabolic, endocrine, and rheumatic diseases. By harmonizing unique health requirements with personal preferences, Dr. Philippou empowers individuals to achieve optimal wellness through tailored nutrition strategies. Her primary objective is to create personalized, evidence-based nutrition protocols that effectively bridge the gap between rigorous academic research and practical clinical application for each client and patient.

Dr. Larissa McGarrity

Larissa McGarrity, PhD is a clinical psychologist in the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation (PM&R) where she provides psychological evaluations and treatment for patients seen by the Comprehensive Weight Management and Bariatric Surgery Programs, as well as clinical coverage for the Inpatient Medical Rehabilitation Unit. She also supervises trainees to perform these clinical services. Dr. McGarrity is Chief of the Section of PM&R Psychology, leading a team of 8 psychologists across 3 subspecialty areas (Rehab, Health/Bariatric, and Neuro Psychology). She also directs ambulatory operations for the Health/Bariatric Psychology Service. Dr. McGarrity’s clinical and translational research program is focused on psychological health for individuals with severe obesity, including the development of interventions to minimize risk factors, optimize resilience in this population. She is currently funded by an NIH/NCATS K12 Institutional Career Development Award. The associated project is a pilot randomized controlled trial testing feasibility, acceptability, and proof-of-concept of a dyadic positive psychology intervention she developed called ReConnect (Reimagining Us in the Context of Bariatric Surgery), designed to improve psychosocial outcomes for patients and their partners in the years following bariatric surgery.

Dr. Jack Cush

Dr. Cush received his medical degree from St George’s University School of Medicine, Grenada, West Indies and completed his residency in internal medicine at Coney Island Hospital, New York City, NY where he was also Chief Resident. He went on to complete a rheumatology fellowship at The University of Texas Health Science Center, Houston, TX and Parkland Memorial Hospital, Dallas, TX. Throughout his career, Dr Cush has held numerous academic positions including Professor of Internal Medicine at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School, Professor of Medicine and Rheumatology at Baylor University Medical Center, Chief of Rheumatology at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital, Director of Clinical Rheumatology for the Baylor Scott & White Research Institute, Dallas, TX and Professor of Medicine at St George’s University School of Medicine. Dr. Cush’s early research focused on cellular immunology, translational research, and drug development of biologic and novel therapies. His clinical interests and expertise include rheumatoid arthritis, Still’s disease, spondyloarthritis, drug safety and clinical trials. Throughout, his career has focused on therapeutics, drug safety, medical education and digital online education. His expertise and research in rheumatology is chronicled in over 150 journal articles and numerous rheumatology textbook chapters, including the chapter on “The Approach to Articular and Musculoskeletal Disorders” in Harrison’s Principles of Internal Medicine (12th–20th edns). Dr. Cush has co-authored the medical textbooks Rheumatology: Diagnosis and Therapeutics (2nd edn, 2005), Rheumatoid Arthritis: Diagnosis and Treatment (4th edn, 2014) and the online textbook RheumaKnowledgy.com (2014). Dr. Cush has been a pioneer in digital online education with the founding of a rheumatology focused website, RheumNow.com, where he is Executive Editor. RheumNow has become a leading educational platform rooted in multimedia dissemination of news, journal advances, patient care guidelines and regulatory changes, for the benefit of rheumatologists and those devoted to musculoskeletal medicine. Dr. Cush has served on the Arthritis Advisory Committee of the US Food & Drug Administration, held numerous leadership and committee positions for the Arthritis Foundation and American College of Rheumatology (ACR) and been a Master of the ACR since 2021. He has held editorial positions for The Journal of Rheumatology and Seminars in Arthritis & Rheumatism, and is past editor of the ACR’s Hotline and Drug Safety Quarterly. He currently serves as Board Chairman of St George’s University School of Medicine.

Dr. Alexis Ogdie

Dr. Ogdie's research program is focused on inflammatory arthritis (IA) including psoriatic arthritis (PsA), axial spondyloarthritis (axSpA), and rheumatoid arthritis (RA). The mission of her research program is to improve outcomes in IA by accelerating diagnosis, increasing the focus on meaningful, patient-centered outcomes, and developing and advancing methods for precision medicine. Dr. Ogdie is an expert in the care of patients with IA, Director of the Penn Psoriatic Arthritis and Spondyloarthritis Program and Director of the Penn Center for Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics. Her areas of expertise include epidemiology and pharmacoepidemiology, biostatistical methods for observational studies (e.g., complex time to event modeling, prediction modeling), outcome measures (e.g., qualitative and quantitative/psychometric assessment), clinical trial design and more general qualitative methods (e.g., survey, focus group and interview studies). Her recent work has focused on a) pragmatic trial design and implementation including the recent launch of a first head-to-head pragmatic trial in PsA (EVOLUTION, NCT05669833); b) trials aimed at improving outcomes in PsA through holistic care including a trial to test Dietary Interventions in PsA (DIPSA, NCT04180904), and a new single arm trial to address whole patient care as a novel care paradigm in rheumatology (funded by a Rheumatology Research Foundation) and c) identifying risk factors for development of PsA among patients with psoriasis.

Dr. Anastassia Amaro

Anastassia Amaro, MD is a Professor of Clinical Medicine in the Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. She serves as the Medical Director at the Center for Weight and Eating Disorders. Dr. Amaro is a graduate of Sechenov Moscow Medical Academy in Moscow, Russia. She completed her internal medicine residency training at Lutheran General Hospital in Chicago, IL and fellowship training in Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism at Washington University and Barnes-Jewish Hospital, St. Louis, MO. Board-certified in both Endocrinology and Obesity Medicine, Dr. Amaro is the founding director of Penn Metabolic Medicine translational center for non-surgical treatment of obesity. Her research interests include different therapeutic approaches to obesity and diabetes. 

Dr. Lourdes Perez-Chada

Dr. Perez-Chada completed medical school at Universidad Austral in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and trained in dermatology at the Universidad de Buenos Aires. In 2018, she received her Master of Medical Sciences in Clinical Investigation from Harvard Medical School. She undertook a clinical research fellowship in psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis and in outcome measures research in the department of dermatology at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital under the mentorship of Joseph F. Merola, MD MMSc from 2018-2021. She joined the department of dermatology at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital as faculty in 2021. Dr. Perez-Chada currently works as a clinical investigator in the department of dermatology at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and is an assistant director of Harvard Medical School’s Master of Medical Science in Clinical Investigation (MMSCI) program. She also serves as board member for the International Dermatology Outcome Measures, Steering Committee member for Group for Research and Assessment of Psoriasis and Psoriatic Arthritis (GRAPPA), and member of the Scientific Advisory Committee of the National Psoriasis Foundation (NPF). Dr. Perez-Chada’s research focuses on (i) increasing understanding of the relationship between sleep and chronic inflammatory skin and musculoskeletal disorders; (ii) advancing outcome measurement in chronic inflammatory dermatoses by developing Core Outcome Sets and psychometrically sound, patient-relevant outcome measures; (iii) raising awareness of psoriatic disease comorbidities and (iv) investigating the events occurring in the transition from psoriasis into psoriatic arthritis. She has been funded by the NPF and GRAPPA.