Laisa Margarita Santiago, MD

Dr. Santiago is the interim chief of pediatric rheumatology in the Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital. She sees patients at the hospital’s main campus in St. Petersburg, Florida. She joined the hospital staff in 2013.

Dr. Santiago earned her doctor of medicine, cum laude, at the Universidad Central Del Caribe in Bayamon, Puerto Rico, where she was inducted into the Alpha Omega Alpha honor medical society. She completed her pediatric residency at Nicklaus Children’s Hospital in Miami and her pediatric rheumatology fellowship at McGaw Medical Center of Northwestern University Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago.

She is the rheumatology rotation director for the Johns Hopkins All Children’s residency program and oversees the educational programs of the rheumatology division. She also serves as medical co-director of the Johns Hopkins All Children’s infusion center and on the advisory board of the Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital Women in Medicine and Science Committee.

Her areas of clinical expertise include systemic lupus erythematosus, vasculitis, juvenile dermatomyositis, scleroderma, juvenile idiopathic arthritis, Sjogren’s syndrome, periodic fever syndromes, and other systemic inflammatory diseases.
Dr. Santiago is a bilingual qualified staff speaker in Spanish.