Charles Peterfy

Charles Peterfy, MD, PhD, is founder and CEO of Spire Sciences. Dr. Peterfy is an internationally recognized leader in imaging for clinical trials, and has been developing, validating and implementing innovative imaging techniques for 25 years. Dr. Peterfy is a board-certified radiologist with fellowship training from University of California San Francisco (UCSF) and a PhD in Pharmacology and Therapeutics from McGill University. He was attending radiologist at UCSF for seven years where he also served as Director of Arthritis Research for the Osteoporosis and Arthritis Research Group. In 1998, Dr. Peterfy co-founded CCBR-Synarc Inc and served as its Chief Medical Officer until leaving to form Spire Sciences in 2009.

Dr. Peterfy has helped introduce numerous methods currently used in clinical trials. He was the first to develop and validate a technique for qualifying articular cartilage volume in the knee using MRI. He developed the fixed-flexion technique for radiology of the knee in osteoarthritis, the SynaFlexer and FixedFlexion positioning frames and projection phantom for reproducible radiography of the knee, and fixed-location joint-space width measurement for monitoring progression of osteoarthritis. Dr. Peterfy co-developed the RAMRIS (Rheumatoid Arthritis MRI Score), PsAMRIS (Psoriatic Arthritis MRI Score) and HOAMRIS (Hand Oasteoarthritis MRI Score) methods as part of the OMERACT (Outcome Measures in Rheumatology Clinical Trials) MRI Working Group.

He developed the CARLOS (Cartilage Loss Score) method for monitoring cartilage loss in rheumatoid arthritis, and invented the Syn-X-RA and X-frame positioning devices for error-free radiography of the hand and foot in arthritis clinical trials, and the Syn-M-RA and M-frame devices for reproducible MRI fo the hand and wrist in arthritis trials. He chaired the Imaging Working Group of the NIH Osteoarthritis Initiative, and co-founded ISEMIR, the International Society for Extremity MRI in Rheumatology. Dr. Peterfy has authored over 150 scientific articles and book chapters, edited two textbooks and participated in numerous standardization committees, scientific advisory boards and expert panels for advancing imaging in clinical trials.