Judith Safford is an economist (Ph.D Freiburg i. Br., Germany), who has dedicated her professional life to excellence in non-profit management. Affected since early adulthood by chronic disease including inflammatory arthritis and a cancer survivor, she works as a patient research partner in healthcare research and as a patient advocate and expert in various national commissions. Her special interest is the involvement of patients in medical research. She is founder and president of the Swiss foundation RheumaCura: rheumacura.ch and writes a blog at arthritisandme.ch. Keeping active is essential to her health and she therefore sneaks off whenever time permits to tramp along a snowy mountain slope or scamper up a rock wall.