David Felson

David Felson, MD, MPH, is the Robert Dawson Evans Distinguished Professor of Medicine at Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine, where he serves as Professor in the Rheumatology section. He is also Professor of Epidemiology at the Boston University School of Public Health and Director of the Clinical Epidemiology Research & Training Unit at Sargent College of Health & Rehabilitation Sciences. Felson earned his AB in History and Biochemistry from Harvard College, his MD from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, and his MPH from Boston University School of Public Health. He holds additional roles as an Investigator in the Framingham Heart Study, Member of the Arthritis & Autoimmune Diseases Research Center, and Member of the Evans Center for Interdisciplinary Biomedical Research at Boston University. He is a Graduate Medical Sciences Educator and Primary Mentor of graduate students.

Dr. Felson's research interests center on osteoarthritis prevention and treatment, including evaluations of rheumatic disease treatment effectiveness, identification and testing of biomechanical risk factors and interventions, and characterization of MRI features in normal and painful knees. He also studies outcome measurement in rheumatic diseases, with a focus on rheumatoid arthritis clinical trials. His influential publications include the "2010 Rheumatoid Arthritis Classification Criteria: An American College of Rheumatology/European League Against Rheumatism Collaborative Initiative" (2010, cited over 17,000 times), "Osteoarthritis: New Insights. Part 1: The Disease and Its Risk Factors" (2000), "American College of Rheumatology Preliminary Definition of Improvement in Rheumatoid Arthritis" (1995), and "Estimates of the Prevalence of Arthritis and Other Rheumatic Conditions in the United States: Part II" (2008). With over 1,000 publications listed on his profile and a verified Google Scholar presence affiliated with Boston University, Felson has shaped epidemiology and clinical understanding of osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis. His honors include designation as Robert Dawson Evans Distinguished Professor of Medicine (2021), the Carol Nachman Prize for Rheumatology (2017), and Master of the American College of Rheumatology (2017).