Dr. Williams is a Professor of Anesthesiology, Medicine (Rheumatology), Psychiatry, and Psychology at the University of Michigan where he also serves as the Associate Director of the Chronic Pain and Fatigue Research Center. He received his doctorate from the Ohio State University and has previously held faculty appointments at both Duke and at Georgetown University Medical Centers. He is both a clinician and researcher with publications in the areas of chronic illness management, digital health, patient-reported outcomes instrument development and validation, and mechanisms of pain perception/modulation. In 2019, he became the University of Michigan site PI for PCORnet where he can facilitate the conduct of multi-site clinical research. Nationally and internationally, he serves on numerous scientific editorial boards and scientific review committees including his recent service to the Interagency Pain Research Coordinating Committee (IPRCC).

Dr. Williams has been publishing pain-related research since 1984 including studies in basic science, human experimental methods, clinical studies and clinical trials, mechanisms of pain processing and modulation, and psychometric instrument development and validation. He has worked for many years to develop and refine cognitive and behavioral pain self-management interventions both in face-to-face formats and digital formats. PainGuide.com is a public-facing product of this ongoing work which is also embedded in the clinical trials being conducted by the NIH HEAL initiative consortium BACPAC. Patient-reported outcomes (PROs) represent another area of his specialization. For many years he worked with the NIH PROMIS initiative to develop IRT and brief CAT-based measures of multiple health-related domains. More recently his work has focused on assessing Chronic Overlapping Pain Conditions (COPCs) and includes the COPC-screener. His work with PCORnet includes helping to develop and maintain the UM infrastructure for participating in national-scale multi-site clinical research – including participation in the NIH RECOVER initiative focused on COVID and Long Haul COVID (PASC). Mentoring in clinical research is another one of his passions. He is a mentor in many in training programs both within UM and at other institutions. Directing and shaping new educational programs in clinical pain research, such as the HEAL National K12 (co-PI) is an example hihs work in this field.