Dr. Wells is currently a practicing rheumatologist and the Director of Rheumatology for the American Medical Group in Destin, FL. He is the co-founder of the Advances in Rheumatology and Technology Symposium. He is the immediate past Midwest Region Director, Department of Rheumatology for the Advocate Health Medical Group in Franklin, Wisconsin. He maintains his clinical affiliation with Duke University Medical Center in Durham, NC where he is an Adjunct Assistant Professor.  Prior to returning to private practice, Dr. Wells was an Associate Medical Director at Abbott Laboratories where he played a central role in the launch of HUMIRA.

Dr. Wells received his MD from the University of South Florida, Tampa and trained in Internal Medicine and in Rheumatology at Duke University, where he was a faculty member before joining Abbott. He received his PhD in Immunology from the University of South Carolina, where he developed an animal model for Reiter’s Syndrome. He was a recipient of the prestigious Fogarty Biomedical Research Award from the National Institutes of Health, which allowed him to undertake a 2-year postdoctoral fellowship at Uppsala University, Sweden, with Dr. Lars Klareskog. Dr. Wells is fluent in Swedish.

A member of the American Telemedicine Association and of the American College of Rheumatology, Dr. Wells has over 25 years of research experience, focusing on chronic inflammatory diseases, such as rheumatoid arthritis and psoriatic arthritis, with an emphasis on connective tissue components, inflammatory mediators, and cytokines. He is the recipient of the 2019 Outstanding Teaching Award from the Medical College of Wisconsin and Ascension St Joseph Hospital.  He is the recipient of the 2003 Abbott President’s Award. In 2001, he was honored with the Merck Young Investigator Award, and in 1999 he received the University of South Carolina School of Medicine Distinguished Alumni Award. Dr. Wells is fluent in Swedish and is an internationally renowned speaker and researcher and has had research support from the Arthritis Foundation and from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.