J .Christian Virchow, MD, FRCP, FCCP, FAAAAI, is a Professor of Medicine and Pneumology and Head of the Departments of Pulmonary Medicine and Intensive Care Medicine in the University Medical Clinic at the University of Rostock, Germany. He is also the Medical Director of the Pulmonary Diagnostic Services and the Sleep Laboratory of the University of Rostock. He is Editor-in-Chief of RESPIRATORY MEDICINE and Visiting Professor of the China-Japan-friendship hospital in Beijing, PR China. He is a member of several medical organizations, including the American Thoracic Society, the European Respiratory Society, and the American College of Chest Physicians. Dr. Virchow serves as Associate Editor for several German journals in pulmonology and allergology and has served as an ad hoc reviewer for Chest, the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, the American Journal of Respiratory Cell and Molecular Biology, the European Respiratory Journal and many others. He is the author or coauthor of more than 200 peer reviewed articles for journals such as JAMA, the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, Chest, and European Respiratory Journal and author of several chapters for text books. He received his doctoral degree from the University of Tübingen, Germany after attending Medical School in Marburg and Giessen, Germany and Zürich, Switzerland. Dr. Virchow completed his residency in internal medicine at University Medical Clinic in Freiburg, Germany, and his fellowship in pulmonary medicine at the Department of Pneumology at the University of Freiburg, Germany under Prof. H. Matthys. His special interests are research into the mechanisms of inflammation in chronic obstructive lung diseases such as asthma and COPD as well as the treatment of these conditions.
