Wait, How Do You Spell That? A Rare Disease Podcast

In this episode, we discuss rare disease dermatology with Dr. Steven Chen, MD of Harvard Medical School. Pemphigus and pemphigoid are rare, auto-immune blistering diseases that affect the skin. Learn more about these two conditions at the International Pemphigus and Pemphigoid Foundation . Find out more about Dr. Chen's work in the field of dermatology here .

This week, we speak with Lindsey Cundiff of the EveryLife Foundation for Rare Diseases about the 2021 RAREis scholarship. This fund helps adult rare disease patients achieve their educational goals. We're also joined by Veronica Tingzon, a 2020 scholarship recipient, who talks about her experiences pursuing a nursing degree. Applications for the 2021 RAREis scholarship just opened. Find out more a...

This week, we speak with EMT and narcolepsy advocate Tara O'Conner about her recently published article on PatientWorthy.com. Tara talks about her journey to diagnosis, why narcolepsy is an under-diagnosed condition and ways friends and family can be supportive of someone with the condition. Read Tara's article here .

This week, Colby talks to Nick Giallourakis, the co-founder and executive director of Elephants and Tea, a non-profit media outlet dedicated to sharing patient voices in the adolescent and young adult cancer community. Find out more about Elephants and Tea here. Their podcast, "Spilling Tea With the G's" is found on YouTube here.

This week, we speak with Annie Kennedy from the EveryLife Foundation about their groundbreaking study examining the economic burden of rare disease. We're joined by Marissa Penrod from Team Joseph, a Duchenne muscular dystrophy nonprofit to discuss how these numbers assist in rare disease advocacy. Read the full study here: www.everylifefoundation.org/burden-study Learn more about the EveryLife Fo...

This week, Colby speaks with Camelia Isaic from HAE Junior in the Czech Republic to discuss her organization's ongoing efforts to improve the lives of HAE patients. Find out more about HAE Junior at www.haejunior.cz . For more information about the Fight the Swell podcast, visit: https://bit.ly/3ojRV9Q

Colby speaks with Gina Glass, the founder of the Dreamsickle Kids Foundation in Nevada. Her sickle cell disease organization has helped to raise awareness and form legislation centered around access in that state. Gina speaks about her ongoing efforts, how to support family members with sickle cell, and what's on the horizon. Find out more at www.dreamsicklekids.org .

Rachel Sutherland, an editor and copywriter with our partners at Snow Companies, shares her cystic fibrosis story. She discusses diagnosis and the importance of establishing a support system.

In this episode, Colby speaks with Taylor Anne Burtz and Peter Zdziarski of the Glanzmann's Research Foundation. Glanzmann's thrombasthenia is rare genetic condition characterized as a blood clotting disorder. Taylor and Peter discuss their personal experiences with the condition and the foundation's goals of connecting patients and advancing research for treatments and a cure. Find out more infor...

Sunni speaks with Adam Settle and his family about the new book chronicling Adam's life with cobalamin C deficiency. The genetic condition can cause blindness, nervous system issues and other symptoms. Learn more about Adam and his book here: https://adamsettle.wordpress.com/ As mentioned in the intro, check out the "Fight the Swell" HAE podcast on YouTube here: https://bit.ly/3ojRV9Q

In this episode, we say goodbye to Patient Worthy managing editor Ilana. Colby and Ilana also discuss Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome and why diagnosis can be such a long road for patients.

In this episode, Ilana and Rebekah talk with Darlene Shelton, the founder of Danny's Dose. It's a nonprofit dedicated to changing emergency medical protocols for chronic illness and rare disease patients. This conversation was recorded at the NIH Rare Disease Day in Februrary, 2020 -- the last in our series of conversations with patients on the front line of rare disease advocacy.

In this episode, Sunni talks with illustrator J.G. Jones, who has worked as a comic book artist for almost 25 years. Jones, who was diagnosed with a type of rare blood cancer, is working on a new project that is bringing attention to myeloproliferative neoplasm patients through a combination of story and illustration.

In this episode, Ilana has a conversation with Jansen's Foundation president and founder Neena Nizar. Jansen's Disease is one one of the rarest disorders in the world, with Neena reporting only 10 known cases worldwide when she started her foundation in 2017. This interview was recorded in February 2020 at NIH Rare Disease Day. Since then, Neena reports that the COVID-19 pandemic has understandabl...

In this episode, managing editor Ilana Bean talks with disease advocate Whitney Carter about her journey to multiple diagnosis and how it led her to getting involved patient awareness. Recorded at the NIH Rare Disease Week in February 2020.

On this episode, Managing Editor Ilana Bean has a conversation with Amy Dahm, the head of Cushing's Support and Research Foundation patient support group for Washington, D.C., Maryland and Virginia. The interview was recorded at Rare Disease Week 2020 in February.

Ilana and Sunni are joined by Annie Kennedy and Lindsey Cundiff from the EveryLife Foundation for Rare Diseases. EveryLife is a nonprofit dedicated to advancing treatment and diagnostic opportunities for rare disease patients through science-driven public policy. In this episode, they discuss the steep road to diagnosis that many rare disease patients face, ways to improve access to treatment and...

In this interview from Rare Disease Day at the NIH, Ilana talks to Harsha Rajasimha, the CEO and founder of Jeeva Informatic Systems about how clinical trials can change to better meet rare patient needs-- in the US, India, and across the world. Learn more at  www.jeevatrials.com  and https://biobuzz.io/this-startup-is-on-a-mission-to-decentralize-cell-and-gene-therapy-trials/.

We're still learning and we're not really the right spokespeople for this subject. However, we also know a podcast about rare disease would be incomplete if we didn't discuss the racism and inequalities Black people in the US face. We're posted a short episode with a brief overview of some of the ways our healthcare system doesn't serve Black people in the US. We encourage you to follow other reso...

Hello! We are back with a conversation recorded during rare disease week with Antonio Maltese, a 23-year-old managing Huntington's disease and ostenecrosis. We talk about disappointing medical care, hope for the future, and fears surrounding the diagnoses. Read more about Antonio at these links:  https://patientworthy.com/2019/05/23/how-i-turned-huntingtons-into-my-lifes-passion-for-change/   http...

Patient Worthy team members Ilana and Sunni talk about mindfulness meditation-- what research is behind it, how can it help chronic pain-- but also, what are its limits? They also chat about their relationship to meditation and personal practices, some thoughts on its shifting place in our culture, and why it's super annoying to tell someone to "just meditate." You can learn more about some of the...

Today we're sharing a conversation with Lynzi Russell from the Connecting Families with UCD Foundation. We talk about what urea cycle disorder is and the difficulties of receiving a rare diagnosis in adolescence-- when the world is horrible and transitional and people aren't really respecting your boundaries. Lynzi shares the ups and downs of her experience with UCD- from diagnosis, to rebellion a...

We've got a short episode with Dan Pezatta, a representative from YARR. YARR might sound like a pirate greeting you but it's actually something even cooler: Young Adults of RDLA (RDLA, in turn stands for Rare Disease Legislative Association.) Dan joined Rebekah and Ilana during Rare Disease Week to talk a little about what led him to advocacy, the legislative change he hopes to see, and what it's...

During rare disease week, we had the chance to talk to Monica Weldon, whose son was the sixth person diagnosed with SYNGAP-1, a gene mutation linked to autism. She tells us about her journey from working as a school teacher to becoming the CEO and founder of Bridge the Gap, the first SYNGAP-1 advocacy organization in the world. She shares what it was like to receive a diagnosis that had no structu...

Patient Worthy writer and staff artist, Sunni, joins Ilana to talk about the only thing any of us can talk about: COVID-19. We're not here to scare you. We talk about what we're doing to cope, weird pressures surrounding self-care, and how the rare disease community is especially affected. Here's the article about being blind during the pandemic that we talked about:  https://www.bbc.com/news/disa...