About Dr. Steven Phillips, MD

Who is Dr. Steven Phillips?

Steven Phillips, MD has spent nearly three decades puzzling out chronic illness due to chronic infections — Lyme, Bartonella, Babesia, and others — the kind of persistent, treatment-refractory cases that leave many patients without answers. He is internationally recognized in this field and has cared for more than 20,000 patients from over 20 countries.

Background & training

His path was unusual. He first earned a double major in Finance & Accounting from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, while graduating a semester early. After that, he went to medical school — but in advance of that, he had made the decision not to accept any financial assistance from his parents, as he felt they had already provided him with more than enough. He earned his MD at SUNY Health Science Center at Syracuse, where he put himself through school. He then completed his Internal Medicine residency at a Yale program, where he participated in basic-science research — studying the microbiology and immunology of B. burgdorferi, the Lyme bacterium — as well as epidemiology research as part of the CDC’s Emerging Infectious Diseases Program.

Research & publications

Dr. Phillips is well-published in the peer-reviewed literature, with a dozen papers — many as lead author — in journals including The Lancet, Lancet Infectious Diseases, the American Journal of Medicine, Clinical Infectious Diseases, the Journal of Infectious Diseases, and Arthritis & Rheumatism. He co-authored the ILADS working group’s evidence-based definition of chronic Lyme disease, and his treatment guidelines were listed by the U.S. National Guideline Clearinghouse.

Leadership & public policy

He served as President of the International Lyme and Associated Diseases Society (ILADS) and on its board for more than a decade. Both state and federal governments have sought his expertise on chronic Lyme disease. At the state level, Connecticut, New York, Rhode Island, and Vermont invited him to give expert testimony — testimony that helped pass laws protecting physicians’ right to treat it and mandating insurance coverage. At the federal level, he was an invited panelist at the December 2025 U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Lyme Disease Roundtable. In 2009 he was also one of a handful of U.S. physicians invited to testify at the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) hearing in Washington, D.C.; his written testimony ran 81 pages with 226 medical references.

Teaching & drug development

He has lectured at a Harvard Medical School affiliate, Yale School of Nursing, MIT, and dozens of medical conferences across the U.S. and Europe. He is a co-founder of Kyronyx Biosciences, developing a new treatment for refractory Lyme and bartonellosis, with research collaborations involving Stanford, Duke, Johns Hopkins, and Tulane.

Honors

He received the Bay Area Lyme Foundation’s Emerging Leader Award and serves on its Scientific Advisory Board, and was honored by Harvard University’s Dean Center in its “Person Who Inspires Us” campaign.

Author & media

He is co-author of the best-selling book Chronic, and writes ZeroSpin, a newsletter and podcast on Substack. He is a sought-after guest across major media — national television (including Dr. Oz and The Doctors), syndicated radio, newspapers, and magazines in the U.S. and Europe — and has authored health articles for major outlets such as NBC. He appeared in Lyme & Reason, the Emmy-winning prime-time special on Lyme disease, and his published research has been carried by the Associated Press and Reuters.

Watch & listen

Watch Dr. Phillips’s talks and interviews on his YouTube channel.

Dr. Phillips’s clinical practice closed for patient care as of June 17, 2026. This website functions as a hub for informational and entertainment purposes. The “Book Dr. Phillips” page is for speaking-engagement requests only.