Season 2 | Episode #18 with Lupus Patient and Policy, Advocacy and Mobilization Manager for SisterLove, Inc., J. Christopher Reed

Season TWO Episode EIGHTEEN of the Your Story Our Fight® podcast welcomes J. Christopher Reed. Christopher Reed was diagnosed with lupus in 1990 at the age of 16. Despite several serious attacks to his organ system, he earned a bachelor’s degree with honors from the Georgia State University and a law degree from Tulane University. He managed his first job out of law school juggling lupus nephritis and horrible chemotherapy treatments.  After an 18 year career in litigation, Christopher has devoted his life to public health and health policy. He is the Policy, Advocacy, and Mobilization Manager for SisterLove, Inc. an organization that is devoted to eradicating challenges to reproductive health and HIV/AIDS. He is a contractor for the American College of Rheumatology, the University of Alabama, and the Lupus Research Alliance on three separate projects devoted to increasing minority participation in clinical trials. He is also an advocate, moderator, and writer for Lupus.net. He now serves as a Support Group Facilitator, Advocacy Chair, and Project Manager for the Lupus Foundation of America-Georgia Chapter. His support group, designed specifically for men, is the first of its kind in the United States. He was appointment by the state and then chaired the Georgia Council on Lupus Education and Awareness (Council) an advisory council created and funded by the state of Georgia. As Chair he established the Georgia Lupus Collaborative, a 60 person multidisciplinary advisory group and think tank charged with improving the lives of people with lupus in Georgia. He was one of twelve panelists chosen to speak at the historical Lupus Patient Focused Drug Development meeting in 2017.