PALS - Amye L. Leong

Amye Leong is an internationally-recognized arthritis health advocate and motivational speaker. She is President & CEO of Healthy Motivation, a health communications, education, advocacy and medical motivation consulting firm based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania USA and Paris FRANCE. Clients include pharmaceuticals, hospital systems, governments, and non-government organizations in 15 countries. Diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis, Sjogren’s syndrome and osteoporosis by age 18 and wheelchair-bound by age 26, Ms. Leong drew upon her personal advocacy skills and determination to work with her health care system to get the care she needed to walk again. After 16 joint replacements and reconstructive surgeries, she now travels the world working with industry, governments, and non-government organizations inspiring audiences to appropriate health policy, healthcare action, and treatment adherence with her stories of strength, compassion and advocacy.

She developed America’s first education, support and advocacy programs for 8.3 million young people affected by rheumatic disease and is regarded as the leader of the young adult/baby boomer arthritis advocacy movement. Ms. Leong spearheaded a national grass-roots effort, bringing together multiple rheumatic disease groups in many states that culminated in Congressional proclamation for Juvenile Arthritis Awareness Week in 1990 that became an annual national effort by the Arthritis Foundation and the American Juvenile Arthritis Organization educating the public. She prompted an annual awareness campaign that garnered over 550,000 media impressions and led to important legislation affecting musculoskeletal research.

She works with industry, non-government organizations, and governments in the areas of health policy and communications, web-based resources, consensus development and facilitation, program development and outreach, health professional and patient education, women’s health, chronic disease and aging, diversity and advocacy issues. Ms. Leong is a popular invited speaker to health professional, clinical, scientific and patient education symposia in Australia, Brazil, China, Japan, South Korea, South Africa, and throughout the USA and Europe. Ms. Leong’s article on “Patient Advocacy and Arthritis” is published in the World Health Organization Bulletin (February 2004). She was the 2004 Distinguished Lecturer at the Scientific Meeting of the Arthritis Health Professions Association in conjunction with the American College of Rheumatology. She was also Human Resource Manager for GTE/Verizon in Los Angeles and a Director of chronic disease websites for Empatheon in Palo Alto, California.

Ms. Leong received the 2001 President’s Community Volunteer Award, America’s highest honor for community service, at the White House from President G.W. Bush. The Arthritis Foundation named her one of the “America’s 50 Heroes.” She is the recipient of the National Arthritis Foundation’s highest honor, the Harding Award, and she carried the Olympic Torch for the Centennial Olympic Games as a Community Hero. She was appointed an Advisor to the National Institute of Arthritis, Musculoskeletal & Skin Diseases and served as Chair of the U.S. Surgeon General’s National Council on Self-Help & Public Health under C. Everett Koop, MD. Ms. Leong has served in leadership positions with the Association for Rheumatology Health Professions, the American College of Rheumatology, Asian Women’s Health Leadership Council, the Arthritis Foundation, and as Chair of the American Juvenile Arthritis Organization. She is the author of widely acclaimed GET A GRIP: A Take Charge Approach to Arthritis (Penguin Putnam 2002) and its Spanish translation SUPÉRATE! (Grupa Medica 2004). In 2007 she received the first Patient Advocacy Award from the American College of Rheumatology, the world’s largest health professional society in musculoskeletal care and research.

As International Spokesperson for the United Nations-endorsed Bone and Joint Decade 2000-2010 (www.bjdonline.org), Ms. Leong is raising awareness and building partnerships in 60 countries to promote patient-centered care, research, education, training, and patient empowerment to combat the rising and disabling impact of bone and joint diseases and to help those affected. She has successfully inspired disparate groups to work together to combat arthritis as the #1 cause for work disability in the US, United Kingdom and other countries. She earned her MBA from Purdue University and her BA in Communications from the University of California, Santa Barbara.