Faculty

Biographical Info

• M.D.: Hahnemann University School of Medicine, Philadelphia
• Post-doctoral Fellowship: The Johns Hopkins University, School of Medicine, Rheumatology
• Internship and Residency: MCP Hahnemann University Hospitals

Dr. Christopher-Stine is a Professor of Medicine and Neurology and the Director and Co-Founder of the Johns Hopkins Myositis Center, a multidisciplinary clinic formally established in 2007. Dr. Christopher-Stine graduated Cum Laude with a B.A. in chemistry from Franklin and Marshall College where she was elected to the Phi Beta Kappa Honor Society. She was elected to the Alpha Omega Alpha medical honor society at Hahnemann University School of Medicine, where she received her MD degree. She attained her Master of Public Health degree from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Her internship and residency training in Internal Medicine were completed at MCP Hahnemann University, where she also served as Chief Resident, after which she pursued rheumatology fellowship training at Johns Hopkins. She is the recipient of the 2001 Golden Stethoscope Award for Excellence in Teaching. She joined the faculty of the Division of Rheumatology at The Johns Hopkins University in 2003.

Currently, she devotes her time to clinical care and clinical research of the idiopathic inflammatory myopathies (“myositis”) and has authored or co-authored over 100 publications. Dr. Christopher-Stine and her colleagues discovered that some statin-related myopathies are, in fact, autoimmune in nature, an example of the excellent collaboration and translational research opportunities at Johns Hopkins that has helped to solve a medical mystery, which has lead to direct patient benefit. As a clinician scientist, she utilizes the Myositis Database developed by her and her colleagues for which she is the Principal Investigator, currently numbering well over 2500 patients recruited worldwide. She was a 2018-2019 United States Myositis Association Grant Awardee for her project “ “The gut and skin microbiota in patients with DM.” The microbiome is increasingly being recognized as an important influence in a wide range of diseases, especially autoimmune conditions. Dr. Christopher-Stine will explore the significance of the microbiome in myositis patients by identifying organisms commonly occurring in dermatomyositis patients. She also has a strong interest in patient-reported outcomes and she is the co-chair of an international effort through the OMERACT organization to develop a novel patient reported outcome measure.

She currently serves as the Deputy Director of Telemedicine in the Division of Rheumatology. In addition, she enjoys teaching both formally and informally at all levels of medical education from students to fellows to faculty. She serves as a board member of the Institutional Review Board at the Johns Hopkins University and she is one of 24 core faculty members to teach in the Johns Hopkins Medical School Colleges Advisory Program, which provides clinical skills instruction in the first year of medical school and continued career advising throughout all four years of medical school. She takes pleasure in the interplay of her roles as clinician, scientist, administrator, and educator.