Chairperson, Department of Internal Medicine
Ralph C. Brown, M.D., Professor of Medicine
Rush University

Email: jochen_riser@rush.edu

Dr. Jochen Reiser is the chairperson of the Department of Medicine at Rush University Medical Center and the Ralph C. Brown, M.D., Professor of Medicine at Rush University. Dr. Reiser is a world-renowned research leader in the field of kidney disease with a heavy focus on molecular biology and genetics. He’s published more than 145 papers, many of them in high impact journals. His contributions range from the identification of the circulating factor suPAR in FSGS to general mechanisms of chronic kidney disease. His work started new research fields and significantly advanced new treatment options for renal diseases. Dr. Reiser directs a NIH-funded research laboratory in biomedical investigation of the kidney. He is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation, the American Clinical and Climatological Society, and the Association of American Physicians.

Dr. Reiser graduated from the Ruprecht Karls University of Heidelberg, Germany and served his residency in internal medicine at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York.  He completed his fellowship in nephrology at Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital at Harvard Medical School in Boston. He then was an assistant professor at Harvard Medical School and the founding director of the glomerular disease program at Massachusetts General Hospital.

Prior to arriving at Rush University in September 2012, Dr. Reiser was a professor of medicine, anatomy and cell biology, vice chairman for research in the department of medicine, and chief of the division of nephrology and hypertension at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. There, he also served as the Interim Chairman of Medicine. In September 2016, Dr. Reiser received the Franz Volhard Award from the German Society of Nephrology for his contributions to medicine and nephrology.

Selected Publications

Schiffer M, Teng B, Gu C, Shchedrina VA, Kasaikina M, Pham VA, Hanke N, Rong S, Gueler F, Schroder P, Tossidou I, Park JK, Staggs L, Haller H, Erschow S, Hilfiker-Kleiner D, Wei C, Chen C, Tardi N, Hakroush S, Selig MK, Vasilyev A, Merscher S, Reiser J, Sever S. Pharmacologicaltargeting of actin-dependent dynamin oligomerization amerliorates chronic kidney disease in diverse animal models. Nature Medicine, 2015; 21:601-609 (PMID: 25962121)

Altintas MM, Reiser J. Bridges to cross, burn and mend: cells of renin lineage as popdocyte progenitors. Am J Physiol Renal Physiol. 2015 Jul 15. doi: 10.1152/ajprenal.00301.2015. [Epub ahead of print]

Staeck O, Slowinski T, Lieker I, Wu K, Rudolph B, Schmidt D, Brakemeier S, Neumayer HH, Wei C, Reiser J, Budde K, Halleck F, Khadzhynov D. Recurrent Primary Focal Segmental Glomerulosclerosis Managed With Intensified Plasma Exchange and Concomitant Monitoring of Soluble Urokinase-Type Plasminogen Activator Receptor-Mediated Podocyte β3-integrin Activation. Transplantation. 2015 Sep 14. [Epub ahead of print]

Trachtman H, Vento S, Herreshoff E, Radeva M, Gassman J, Stein DT, Savin VJ, Sharma M, Reiser J, Wei C, Somers M, Srivastava T, Gipson DS. Efficacy of galactose and adalimumab in patients with resistant focal segmental glomerulosclerosis: report of the font clinical trial group. BMC Nephrol. 2015 Jul 22;16:111. doi: 10.1186/s12882-015-0094-5.

Hayek SS, Sever S, Ko YA, Trachtman H, Awad M, Wadhwani S, Altintas MM, Wei C, Hotton AL, French AL, Sperling LS, Kerakis S, Quyyumi AA, Reiser J. Soluble Urokinase Receptor and Chronic Kidney Disease. New England Journal of Medicine 2015, DOI: 10.1056/NEJMoa1506362