Dr. Rick Silver is Professor of Medicine and Pediatrics and has served as Director of the Division of Rheumatology and Immunology since 1995.  In 2007, he was named Distinguished University Professor, the highest academic rank bestowed at MUSC.  The Division has seen remarkable growth in all facets, including extramural research funding, clinical services, and fellowship training during his tenure as Division Director.

Dr. Silver's research interests center on scleroderma and, in particular, scleroderma lung disease, now the leading cause of death among patients with scleroderma.  He and his colleagues were the first to utilize bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) to characterize scleroderma lung disease.  He played an instrumental role in the design and development of the Scleroderma Lung Study (SLS) and continues to serve as principal investigator for the SLS's Biological Samples Repository.  Dr. Silver helped to initiate and develop MUSC’s Pulmonary Hypertension Center led by Dr. Kristin Highland. Dr. Silver was principal investigator of a Multidisciplinary Clinical Research Center (MCRC) for the Study of Rheumatic Diseases in African-Americans funded by NIAMS.

Dr. Silver’s clinical interests include scleroderma and scleroderma-related conditions, as well as childhood rheumatic diseases.  MUSC is one of the world’s leaders in clinical care and investigation of systemic sclerosis (scleroderma) and scleroderma-like conditions, e.g. eosinophilic fasciitis and the eosinophilia-myalgia syndrome.  MUSC also serves as the state of South Carolina's only referral center for childhood rheumatic diseases.  Dr. Silver has led the efforts to coordinate care for children in South Carolina with rheumatic diseases for the past 25 years, and he continues to provide clinical care and conduct clinical research with Dr. Tasha Ruth, and Dr. Murray Passo, whose primary appointments are in the Department of Pediatrics.