Despite current treatment options and guidelines, many patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) or lupus nephritis (LN) continue to experience suboptimal disease control. Join Dr. Ann Clarke, Prof. Eric Morand and Prof. Edward Vital as they discuss the current unmet needs in the SLE/LN treatment landscape and explore the rationale for targeting B cells in this patient population, including current and future strategies for B cell depletion.

Chair:

Dr. Clarke is a Professor in the Division of Rheumatology, Department of Medicine at the Cumming School of Medicine, University of Calgary and holds the Arthritis Society Chair in Rheumatic Diseases. Between 1997 and 2013, she was Co-Director of the McGill University Health Centre Lupus Clinic, one of the largest such clinics in North America, and in 2013, she instituted and is the current Director of the University of Calgary Lupus/ Antiphospholipid Syndrome (APS) Centre of Excellence. She served as chair of the Systemic Lupus International Collaborating Clinics (SLICC) between 2016 and 2020 and is a member of the Canadian Network for Improved Outcomes in SLE (CaNIOS), the Lupus Clinical Investigators’ Network (LuCIN), and APS ACTION. Her research focuses on the risk and determinants of malignancy in SLE, the socioeconomic burden of SLE, and clinical trials of novel therapeutics. Dr. Clarke has published over 450 manuscripts and is very engaged in training future generations of lupus clinicians and investigators and advocating for equitable publicly funded access to lupus therapies.

Speakers:

Eric Morand graduated from Monash University, and trained in rheumatology in Australia and the Royal National Hospital for Rheumatic Diseases, UK. His laboratory research has focussed on glucocorticoid-induced proteins in the immune system, and his clinical research on systemic lupus erythematosus. He founded the Asia Pacific Lupus Collaboration, which developed and validated the Lupus Low Disease Activity State (LLDAS) endpoint, and lead the TULIP2 trial of anifrolumab, resulting in regulatory approval of anifrolumab in the US, Japan, Australia, and EU. He continues to lead projects aimed at improving measurement in SLE, multi-omics studies examining ancestry-based variation in lupus phenotype, and collaborates on drug and cell therapy discovery programs. He is a lead investigator in multiple clinical trials. Awards include the William E Paul Distinguished Innovator Award and Global Team Science Award of the Lupus Research Alliance, New York, and the Evelyn V Hess Award of the Lupus Foundation of America.

Dr. Ed Vital is a Professor of Autoimmune Connective Tissue Diseases at the Leeds Institute of Rheumatic and Musculoskeletal Medicine at the University of Leeds, Leeds, UK and is the head of the Lupus Research Group. He is also a Member of the SLEuro Executive Committee, Chair of the British Society for Rheumatology Special Interest Group for SLE, and Chair of the British Isles Lupus Activity Group. His research interests are focused on skin and musculoskeletal manifestations of lupus. He is interested in improving the understanding and treatment of these subsets of disease through musculoskeletal imaging and rheumato-dermatology. His research themes include identifying people at risk of SLE for early diagnosis and treatment, stratified medicine and biomarkers, outcome measures, lupus arthritis, cutaneous lupus, B cell therapies and type I Interferons in autoimmunity. In 2019, he won the Michael Mason Prize (British Society of Rheumatology) and in 2018, the Medical Research Foundation Emerging Leaders Award.

Join Drs Dall’Era and Rovin at this educational lunch symposium for a lively discussion on incorporating new REGENCY trial data into guideline-aligned treatment for lupus nephritis. During this session, the faculty will actively engage with the audience in interactive discussion as they examine how these opportunities for practice changes can be applied in the clinical setting to improve patient outcomes. To register or learn more, visit: https://bit.ly/LNtreatmentLUPUS2025 

Chairs:

Brad H. Rovin, MD, FACP, FASN Dr. Brad H. Rovin is the Lee A. Hebert Professor of Nephrology. Dr. Rovin received his Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering from Northwestern University in Evanston Illinois and his Doctor of Medicine from the University of Illinois Medical School in Chicago, Illinois. He completed a residency in Internal Medicine at Barnes Hospital in St. Louis Missouri, and a Fellowship in Nephrology at Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis. He joined the Ohio State University College of Medicine Faculty in 1990, became Director of the Division of Nephrology in 2004, and served as Vice Chairman of Medicine for Research from 2009-2019. In 2019 he became the Medical Director of the Ohio State University Center for Clinical Research Management. Dr. Rovin has had several committee and leadership roles in the American Society of Nephrology, including the annual meeting program committee, running the Glomerular Diseases Pre-Course and Co-Editing NephSAP-Glomerular Diseases, a continuing education program of the Society. He serves as deputy Editor of Kidney International, the flagship journal of the International Society of Nephrology, and he is Co-Chair for glomerular disease guideline development for the Kidney Disease Improving Global Outcomes effort. Most recently he received the Evelyn Hess Award from the Lupus Foundation of America for research contributions to improve the understanding of lupus nephritis. Dr. Rovin’s laboratory studies the immunopathogenesis of glomerular and autoimmune diseases and focuses on biomarker development for non-invasive assessment of kidney pathology. He is heavily involved in clinical trial development and design for investigator-initiated and industry-sponsored trials. He is a founding member of NephroNet, a grass-roots nephrology clinical trial organization, and the Lupus Nephritis Clinical Trials Network. He is and has been the Principal Investigator on several trials of novel therapeutics for glomerular diseases.

Dr. Maria Dall’Era is the Jean S. Engleman Distinguished Professor in Rheumatology and Chief of the Division of Rheumatology at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). She also earned her medical degree, completed her residency in internal medicine, and her rheumatology fellowship at UCSF. She is a practicing rheumatologist and clinical researcher who leads an integrated research program focused on three closely related goals: (i) improving our understanding of the molecular and epidemiologic basis for SLE, (ii) developing novel approaches to the treatment of SLE and lupus nephritis, and (iii) finding biomarkers that predict treatment response and long-term outcome in patients with lupus nephritis. She is currently the protocol chair of an NIH-funded clinical trial in lupus nephritis, the PI of a CDC-funded longitudinal lupus cohort of patients, and a co-PI on various translational studies focused on lupus nephritis and cutaneous lupus. She serves on the Lupus Guideline Committee for the American College of Rheumatology. She received the Edmund L. Dubois Memorial Lectureship Award from the American College of Rheumatology, the Ephraim Engleman Award for Excellence in Arthritis Research, and the Evelyn V. Hess Award from the Lupus Foundation of America for outstanding contributions to lupus research.

Innovation theater providing medical education on cutaneous lupus erythematous from a dermatologist perspective

• Describe cutaneous lupus and the subtypes
• Walk through the patient journey
• Discuss burden of cutaneous lupus
• Recognize the unmet need in the treatment of cutaneous lupus
• Understand the pathophysiology of cutaneous lupus

Chair:

Dr. Victoria Werth is a Professor of Dermatology and Medicine at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania and Chief of the Division of Dermatology at the Philadelphia Veterans Administration Hospital. Dr. Werth earned her medical degree from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, Maryland. She completed a residency in internal medicine at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago, Illinois, and dermatology residency and immunodermatology fellowship at New York University School of Medicine in New York, funded by the NIH and Dermatology Foundation. She joined the faculty at Penn in 1989 and has developed an internationally recognized program in autoimmune skin diseases. She is a co-founder of the Rheumatologic Dermatology Society and previous president of the group. She is co-founder of the Medical Dermatology Society, and a recipient of their lifetime achievement award. She initiated the combined internal medicine/dermatology residency program in the U.S., which has successfully trained prominent leaders in complex medical dermatology. She has a longstanding interest in clinical and translational research pertaining to cutaneous lupus erythematosus, with a focus on improving the outcomes of autoimmune dermatologic diseases.