Zsuzsanna H. McMahan MD, MHS

Dr. Zsuzsanna McMahan is an Associate Professor of Medicine in the Division of Rheumatology at the Johns Hopkins Scleroderma Center. She attained her Masters in Health Sciences at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. She spent a few years training with experts in the Johns Hopkins GI Dysmotility Center (e.g., Drs. Jay Pasricha, Subhash Kulkarni, and Jiande Chen) and as a consulting rheumatologist in the multidisciplinary GI clinic.

Through regular meetings, clinics, and conferences with this group, she developed clinical expertise in the management of complex GI dysmotility syndromes and a background in clinical and translational research pertaining to neurogastroenterology.

Dr. McMahan’s clinical and research interests remain focused on the gastrointestinal (GI) complications of scleroderma (SSc) and she is well-published in this field. She continues to partner with basic scientists to better understand the mechanisms driving SSc GI disease, and co-directs both the Scleroderma Clinical Trials Consortium Working GI Working Group (with Dr. Elizabeth Volkmann) and the World Scleroderma Foundation ad hoc GI Committee (with Dr. Michael Hughes) to advance research in this area.

Her research program at Johns Hopkins is currently focused on developing clinical prediction tools for SSc GI patient risk stratification, identifying biomarkers of SSc GI disease activity, identifying patients who will optimally benefit from existing therapies, and developing novel targeted therapies to prevent SSc GI disease progression and reverse damage. This research is funded by the National Institute of Health, the Rheumatology Research Foundation, the Jerome L. Greene Foundation, Promote Altriusm, and the Scleroderma Research Foundation.

Dr. McMahan also serves as the Chair of the Committee on Finance for the American College of Rheumatology.