Global Parents for Eczema Research (GPER) was formed by two parents of children with eczema in 2015. Both parents had separately struggled with finding evidence-based information to guide medical decisions and a lack of safe, long-term treatment options to manage the chronic condition. At that time, there had been no significant new treatments developed for children with eczema in decades. GPER formed around the need for research to support evidence-based medical decision making on behalf of children with eczema and to create more urgency around the need for better treatments. Created for and by parents of children with moderate to severe eczema, GPER is a virtual organization with members representing five different continents and 17 countries.

Staff
Korey Capozza, MPH, Founder and Executive Director
Korey Capozza is the founder of Global Parents for Eczema Research and the mother of a child with moderate to severe eczema. Her professional background is in public health, patient-focused technology innovation and community-based research. She has served as the Principal Investigator for three pilots that explored using new technology to empower patients to manage their own health. Korey is a patient reviewer and mentor for the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute, the British Journal of Dermatology, and the Journal of Research Involvement and Engagement. She has served as a consumer representative on county, state, and federal committees, including, most recently, as a consumer representative to the Dermatologic and Ophthalmic Drugs Advisory Committee of the federal Food and Drug Administration.

Keri Kelley, Community Manager
Keri is the mother of two children with eczema. She serves as lead mentor for the Support for Eczema Caregivers initiative and supports GPER's research and community-building programs. Keri has been with GPER since 2015.

Michelle Tu, Communications Intern
Michelle is a pre-medical student at University of California, Santa Barbara. She joined GPER in the summer of 2020 and is helping to build our social media presence and capacity, as well as support our teen social video challenge and other priorities. She hopes to pursue a medical degree in the future with a focus on pediatrics.

Jessica Lang, Research Intern
Jessica is a fourth year psychology and neuroscience student at University of California, Santa Barbara. She supports GPER's research initiatives, including the Major Life Decisions Impact Survey and the Global Atopic Dermatitis Scorecard project.

2020-2021 GPER Board of Directors:

Santanna Hernandez, Mother of four children with eczema and internal medicine physician trainee, Canada
Navdeep Gosal, Mother of child with eczema and technology entrepreneur, USA
Dr. Jeff McBride, Dermatologist, University of Miami, USA
Lynda Mitchell, Founder, Kids with Food Allergies and patient advocate, USA
Dr. Peck Ong, Pediatric Immunologist, University of Southern California, USA
Dr. Ian Myles, head of the Epithelial Therapeutics Unit at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, USA