John Isaacs
Professor of Clinical Rheumatology & Director
Therapeutics North East, Newcastle University
Associate Medical Director & Consultant Rheumatologist
Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
United Kingdom
Prof. John Isaacs is Professor of Clinical Rheumatology and Director of Therapeutics North East at Newcastle University and Associate Medical Director for Research and Consultant Rheumatologist at Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. Over the past 25 years, his work has focused on the potential of novel immunotherapies to treat Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA), ranging from target identification to early and late stage clinical trials.
Prof. Isaacs runs a research group focused on therapeutic tolerance induction, including the development of robust tools for immunological monitoring of recipients of tolerogenic therapies. His team has pioneered tolerogenic dendritic cell therapy for inflammatory arthritis patients. He also has a longstanding interest in precision therapeutics for rheumatic disease, having led the Medical Research Council/Association of British Pharmaceutical Industries (MRC/ABPI) RA-MAP consortium, seeking prognostic and therapeutic biomarkers for RA.
In 2019, Prof. Isaacs became a National Institute for Health Research Senior Investigator, and is past Chair of the Scientific Committee of the European Alliance of Associations for Rheumatology (2019-21). From 2007 to 2017 Prof. Isaacs chaired Arthritis Research UK’s Clinical Study Group for Adult Inflammatory Arthritis, developing a competitive research agenda for the UK.
As Associate Medical Director for Research at Newcastle Hospitals he has developed a research strategy focused on embedding research into every day patient care. He is also Research Director of Newcastle Health Innovation Partners (Newcastle’s Academic Health Science Centre), where his focus is ensuring research discoveries are appropriately evaluated and adopted, ultimately improving the health and wealth of the regional population and beyond.