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Professor Kirkham is a Consultant Rheumatologist at Guy’s & St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, London, and Professor of Translational Rheumatology, King's College London.

Professor Kirkham qualified as a doctor in New Zealand, then undertook his postgraduate rheumatology training at Guy’s Hospital, London. After working at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research in Melbourne, Australia, in 1991 he became a Consultant Rheumatologist in Adelaide and Sydney. His work focussed on clinical trials of new treatments and investigation of immune mechanisms, in particular IL-17 pathways, in inflammatory arthritis.

He was appointed to Guy’s & St. Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust in 2000. In 2001 he was co-CI of the first study of infliximab in psoriatic arthritis. He set up a dedicated service to optimise care of patients with rheumatoid and psoriatic arthritis which received the British Society of Rheumatology inaugural Outstanding Best Practice Award in 2013. A close working relationship with the St John’s Institute of Dermatology, the largest centre for psoriasis in southern England is integral to this service, with a large patient group. In 2016, his team was named by GRAPPA as one of seven international best practice centres. His translational research is focussed on IL-17/23 immunology and best practice in inflammatory arthritis.