Peter A. Merkel, MD, MPH

Dr. Merkel is the Chief of Rheumatology and a Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Merkel is an internationally recognized research and clinical expert in vasculitis, scleroderma, and other systemic autoimmune diseases, and is an author on over 400 scientific publications. He is the Principal Investigator of the Vasculitis Clinical Research Consortium (VCRC) and the Vasculitis Patient-Powered Research Network (VPPRN), two leading international research infrastructures for clinical investigation in vasculitis. Dr. Merkel’s research focuses on clinical trial design and conduct, outcome measure development, clinical epidemiology, genetic epidemiology, and biomarker discovery.

Dr. Merkel received his MD from Yale University, his MPH from Harvard University, completed his residency training at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania and his fellowship at the Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School. He has been a faculty member at Harvard Medical School, Boston University School of Medicine, and now the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. Dr. Merkel has received the majority of his research support from the National Institutes of Health, the US Food and Drug Administration, the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute, with additional funding from industry sources and private foundations.