April 17, 2026
10 min read
Key takeaways:
- The Congress of Clinical Rheumatology grew from a basement gathering in 1983 to the ‘premier meeting for clinical rheumatologists in the country.’
- David and Pamela McLain make attendees ‘feel like part of the family.’
The Congress of Clinical Rheumatology annual meetings have over the past 43 years grown from a few doctors in a basement in Alabama to a multinational presence that attracts biggest names in the field.
That success is largely the result of a lifetime commitment from its creators, David A. McLain, MD, MACR, FACP, FRCP, executive director of the Alabama Society for the Rheumatic Diseases and symposium director of the Congress of Clinical Rheumatology, and Pamela McLain, MD, FAAD, symposium coordinator at the Congress of Clinical Rheumatology.
“I consider this to be the premier meeting for clinical rheumatologists in the country,” Leonard H. Calabrese, DO, chief medical editor of Healio Rheumatology, professor of medicine at the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine of Case Western Reserve University, and RJ Fasenmyer chair of clinical immunology at the Cleveland Clinic, told Healio.
Leonard H. Calabrese
“I base that statement on its track record, longevity and the doctors McLain, both David and Pam,” he added. “They have made a commitment that has served not only to educate clinicians but to propel the profession of rheumatology forward.”
The McLains, for their part, are modest about such claims, but they do not necessarily deny them.
“Dave started it; it was his idea,” Pam said in a dual interview with both McLains.
“When I was at Washington University in St. Louis, they had organized a rheumatology update meeting,” David said. “I learned a lot seeing them run this meeting.”
Soon after, when David was working at Brookwood Medical Center, in Birmingham, Alabama, inspired by the conference he had attended in St. Louis, he wanted to offer a forum for rheumatology professionals to learn and exchange information.
“That first meeting, before it had a name, before it was CCR, there were about 30 of us in the basement classroom at Brookwood,” he said. “That was in 1983.”
David took an important lesson from the sessions at St. Louis: Not all speakers are created equal.
‘Yeomen of rheumatology’
Although David applauds the efforts of meeting organizers at other conferences, he said that some of his earliest experiences of such conferences in the rheumatology space were not ideal.
“Our department chairman was a complement expert from the NIH,” he said. “He gave a lecture on ‘the foot’ and it was embarrassing. He wasn’t an expert on the foot. I realized that if you are going to have someone talk about something, you should make sure they are an expert in that subject.”
Meanwhile, the field of rheumatology had been experiencing significant changes in the 1980s, according to David.
“There were new NSAIDs and a cancer drug, methotrexate, was being recommended in rheumatoid arthritis, and there was interest in reversing the pyramid,” he said. “We thought we needed to be ‘cutting edge’ in our topics.”
Stephen M. Lindsey, MD, MACR, a professor of rheumatology at Louisiana State University, first attended CCR in 1986.
Stephen M. Lindsey
“As far back as I can remember, they have had the best speakers at their meeting,” he said. “And as far as I know, that is largely due to Pam. David is the moderator, the emcee, and it certainly started with him, but Pam is the engine behind this.”
Through the years, Lindsey said he has seen the results of Pam’s drive to bring in top-notch talent firsthand.
“She spends a lot of time looking at who is available and what their research premises are,” Lindsey said. “She picks out people who are at the cutting edge of the field, who are well known, and who know how to give a presentation.”
Pamela McLain
The result is a long history of speakers from all corners of the world who are doing the most important work in the specialty.
“I realized when I went there the first time that I saw people at their meeting that I had never seen at ACR,” Calabrese said. “Talking to them, I realized that these are the yeomen of rheumatology. These are the people doing the work to push the field forward.”
Calabrese described the average CCR speaker as “very sharp and very practical.”
“From the beginning, I could see that the faculty was world class,” he said. “They emphasize practical topics, the things that people in our field really want to hear about.”
The logistics of CCR contributes to its effectiveness, according to Lindsey. All meeting sessions are presented in one room, with all attendees seated together, eating together, and often gathering together in the common areas of the hotel in the evening.
“At ACR or other national or international meetings, you might pick a couple sessions to attend, but they end up being a quarter-mile away from each other,” he said. “If you are a researcher looking at specific scientific areas, ACR can be focused and productive, but for a practitioner hoping to learn how to manage a wide variety of patients in their clinic, it can be a lot harder to get the information you need. At CCR, you pick a seat, you stay there for 3 or 4 days, and all of that information comes to you.”
The coffee breaks and community meals that are built into the program also serve a purpose.
“Between sessions, you are talking about what you just learned, you are talking about specific cases with your colleagues,” Lindsey said. “I have learned so much at mealtimes or sitting around the pool. Then you can take this information back to your practice or your group. It is always actionable.”
Rheum on the Beach
Despite its modest beginnings, it was not long before the McLains had a broader vision for their conference. The focus on quality speakers and those actionable topics drew attention from around the Gulf region. So, in 1985, they moved their operation to Destin, Florida.
“In 1985, it was suggested that we move to Destin because we might get more people coming out of the Southeast,” David said. “People would go there for vacation. We called it Rheum on the Beach.”
The assumption that a more attractive location would draw talent proved correct. More than 100 attendees descended on Destin from Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Texas, Florida and Tennessee during that first year, according to Pam.
After a year at another resort, the second edition of Rheum on the Beach moved to the Hilton, and they have been in the same location ever since.
This was when Lindsey got involved.
“I was running a practice in Virginia at the time and head of rheumatology for Eastern Virginia Medical School,” he said. “I was doing a lot of talks for different companies. I heard about this meeting in Destin, and that there would be a lot of product theaters, so that is why I went the first few years.”
Lindsey said he was struck by both the location and the McLains.
“The Hilton is a great spot, right on the beach,” he said. “Those first meetings I went to were fairly small, but David and Pam, as you know, are very personable. They will make an effort to meet you, talk to you, make you feel comfortable.
“The meeting that the McLains created was one where you could go to learn but also relax,” Lindsey added. “The speakers were always great, but you could also play golf or tennis or participate in a fishing tournament. It was right on the beach, so a lot of us brought our families or partners.”
Although the McLains had been running the meeting since the days at Brookwood, they did not actually take over full control until 2004. At that point, they had some substantial logistical and financial decisions to make about the agenda, sponsorships and even the audio-visual set-up. Their older son, Edward, although working in IT, had AV experience running theater productions in high school, and took on the role of running the tech component of the meeting, making it a truly family affair. Meanwhile, their younger son, Richard, armed with software engineering and MBA degrees, became involved with the meeting’s website and marketing.
“In 2009, we changed the name from Rheumatology on the Beach to CCR,” David said. “Pharma was changing and was more hesitant to support a meeting with ‘beach’ in the title. We wanted to emphasize how important the educational content was and extend our audience.”
With the name change finalized and an already established precedent of expert speakers, the McLains began to focus more attention on another key component of the CCR brand — educating the next generation of rheumatologists.
‘Fired up’ fellows
The North American Young Rheumatology Investigator Forum (NYRIF) started as a rheumatology research meeting for trainees at the Southern Society for Clinical Investigation (SSCI), according to David. After bouncing between SSCI and CCR for a few years in the early 2000s — as well as a name change from the National Young Rheumatology Investigator Forum — Pam took over for good in 2010.
“I was really interested in the fellows’ program,” she said. “My father was a dentist and oral surgeon who went to the NIH, became an internationally renowned scientist, and discovered collagenase in humans. As a high school and college student, I was fortunate to be able to do voluntary research at the NIH and University of Alabama Birmingham. From that experience, I learned the importance of mentors in developing lifelong scientific and professional skills. I saw NYRIF as a way to engage fellows and prospective fellows in research, and to help mentor and encourage them.”
The first years of CCR had eight to 10 fellows participating, with Lindsey eventually becoming involved in running poster sessions with the trainees.
“It is so satisfying to give them the opportunity to present their abstracts orally, to critique what they are doing, good and bad, to give them a learning experience that they can use for the rest of their careers,” he said.
NYRIF’s social aspects are another key component of the program. Fellows at the event gain the opportunity to network with the people who will be their colleagues throughout their careers, Lindsey said.
“They can find out whether they want to manage patients or do research, or who they want to go into practice with,” he said. “Most importantly, they are working side by side with leaders in the field. They can have conversations over coffee with Len Calabrese or Iain McInnes, the biggest names in rheumatology. The NYRIF component of CCR is really important for our trainees on so many levels.”
The deep history of CCR can even be found in NYRIF, according to David.
“One of the first fellows to win was Alfred Kim from Washington University in St Louis,” he said. “He is speaking at CCR-East and on the Panel for NYRIF for 2026. The circle of life.”
Calabrese, who regularly leads groups of fellows to discuss posters at CCR, characterized the McLains as “pioneers” in developing meeting programs and opportunities for fellows.
“These fellows are fired up and excited to learn and present their research,” he said. “The McLains have invested their own time and money to help offset the expenses for these trainees and young investigators to come to CCR and have these opportunities. That is such a significant commitment to our profession. It makes their meeting strong, and it makes the leaders in the field honored to keep coming back. I have spoken at this meeting for many years, and I am always flattered to be invited, and I always go out of my way to accommodate them.”
Westward and other expansions
Despite the growth and relative success of CCR on Florida’s Gulf Coast, Pam recognized they were still not serving certain populations, particularly those further west.
“We just did not seem to be reaching enough rheumatologists on the West Coast,” Pam said.
This ultimately led to the first CCR West in 2019. This version of the annual meeting has since moved from its original home in Coronado/San Diego to Huntington Beach, in Orange County.
“We wanted to give practitioners on the West Coast the CCR experience in their back yard,” Pam added.
For Pam, rheumatology is personal. In her younger years, she competed in equestrian events at the Olympic level, having qualified as a candidate for the games with her horse, Co-Pilot II, despite being diagnosed with juvenile rheumatoid arthritis — now known as JIA — at age 8 years. However, her health eventually caught up with her, with a diagnosis of lupus/rhupus when she was 29 years old, after the birth of their second child. Years of steroid use for these conditions then led to glucocorticoid-induced osteoporosis later in her medical career, along with joint damage.
“I had to give up my horses and my practice,” Pam said. “I could not hold instruments anymore or perform surgery, or even ride without fracturing my back. I had to give up on my dreams and what I knew as my life. I wanted to prevent this from happening to other people, and that started with educating rheumatologists on the best available, up-to-date treatments.”
Pam describes CCR as a “mission,” sometimes working 10 to 12 hours a day, 7 days a week. That work ethic kept her moving to further expand CCR’s programs and reach
“In 2020, we started the A & R Medical Education Foundation, to help fund our fellows more,” she said.
Additionally, CCR continues to offer virtual platforms for both of its meetings, even as many organizations have ceased their virtual components following the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We think it is important to spread our message as far and wide as possible,” Pam said.
Meanwhile, for the first time this year, CCR East will feature a rheumatology-dermatology summit, with experts from each specialty providing short lectures, panel discussions, “stumper sessions” and audience participation, according to Pam.
Amidst all this growth, the biggest names and the foremost experts will continue to return each year, not just for the education — or the sunshine — but for the McLains, according to Calabrese.
“For more than 2 decades, I’ve been running a very successful series of educational meetings at the Cleveland Clinic, and I’m very proud of them,” Calabrese said. “But I will tell you honestly that every time I come to CCR, I take away new lessons on how to successfully run and sustain such meetings that meet the needs of busy clinicians in rheumatology.”
Lindsey agreed.
“David and Pam have made me feel like part of the family,” he said. “This is why I have been to 30 of the 41 meetings they have had, and will keep coming back.”
For more information:
Leonard H. Calabrese, DO, can be reached at CALABRL@ccf.org.
Stephen M. Lindsey, MD, MACR, can be reached at slinds@lsuhsc.edu.
David A. McLain, MD, MACR, FACP, FRCP, can be reached at david.mclain@gmail.com.
Pamela McLain, MD, FAAD, can be reached at pmclain@ccrheumatology.com.
Sources/Disclosures
Source:
Healio Interviews
Disclosures:
Calabrese reports being a medical advisor for OpenEvidence, as well as professional relationships with AbbVie, AstraZeneca, Bristol Myers Squibb, Galvani, Genentech, GlaxoSmithKline, Janssen, Novartis, Regeneron, Sanofi and UCB. David McLain reports being the symposium director of the Congress of Clinical Rheumatology. Pamela McLain reports being the symposium coordinator at the Congress of Clinical Rheumatology. Lindsey reports no relevant financial disclosures.
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