The 2019 ACR Award Winners & Distinguished Fellows

Distinguished Service Award

The ACR Distinguished Service Award was presented to Polly Ferguson, MD, the Marjorie K. Lamb professor of Pediatrics at the University of Iowa, Iowa City, for her outstanding and sustained service to the ACR.

Dr. Ferguson strongly believes in the ACR’s mission for a multitude of reasons. She says the organization provides those in academic medicine with opportunities to advance their careers, advocates for patients and providers at the government level to ensure needed care is delivered and leads clinicians, researchers and practitioners in rheumatology.

She has served on at least eight different ACR committees, including the Pediatric Rheumatology Section Executive Committee, the Committee on Research, the Abstract Review Committee, the Abstract Oversight Committee, a research subcommittee of the Government Affairs Committee, the Committee on Nominations and Appointments, and the JIA Treatment Guideline Development Group. She also chaired the Pediatric Rheumatology Special Committee.

Dr. Ferguson is now a member of the NIH’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Board of Scientific Counselors, the Arthritis Foundation’s Medical and Scientific Advisory Committee and the American Board of Pediatrics’ Rheumatology sub-board.

She received her medical degree from the Roy J. and Lucille A. Carver College of Medicine at the University of Iowa in 1990. During the next decade, she completed her training at the University of Virginia School of Medicine, Charlottesville, which included her pediatric residency, pediatric rheumatology and immunology fellowship and a postdoctoral research fellowship.

In 2000, she served for two years as an assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of Alabama, Birmingham. In 2002, she returned to the University of Iowa, where she now serves as the director of pediatric rheumatology, allergy and immunology at the Stead Family Department of Pediatrics.

Her current NIH-funded research focuses on uncovering the genetic and immunologic basis of autoinflammatory diseases, particularly those that affect the bone, and understanding the role of inflammation in neurologic disease. She has identified several genes that cause sterile osteomyelitis and has translated findings into effective treatment. Her work has been cited in medical journals nearly 5,000 times.

Meanwhile, she has mentored many undergraduate, graduate, postdoctoral fellows and junior faculty from the University of Iowa and other schools. She also serves as the training director of the university’s Department of Pediatrics K–12 Child Health Research Career Development Award program.

“What means the most to me about this award is that my peers thought to nominate me, when there are so many other outstanding volunteers, and that they value what I’ve done,” says Dr. Ferguson. “It’s a very humbling experience.”