PatrĂ­cia Silva, PhD, director of science content —

PatrĂ­cia holds a PhD in medical microbiology and infectious diseases from the Leiden University Medical Center, Netherlands, and completed a postdoctoral research fellowship at the Instituto de Medicina Molecular, Lisbon, Portugal. Her work in academia was mainly focused on molecular biology and the genetic traits of infectious agents such as viruses and parasites. PatrĂ­cia earned several travel awards to present her work at international scientific meetings. She is a published author of several peer-reviewed science articles.

Articles by PatrĂ­cia Silva

Scleroderma Patients with Hand Dysfunction Show Sustained Benefits from Cell Therapy

Cytori Therapeutics, Inc., a company focused on developing autologous cell therapies from adipose tissue for the treatment of several conditions, recently announced sustained positive results from its SCLERADEC-I clinical trial assessing the effects of Cytori Cell Therapy (ECCS-50) in patients with hand dysfunction related to scleroderma. Specifically, the company reported that…

Top 10 Scleroderma Articles of 2015

Throughout 2015, Scleroderma News reported on studies characterizing scleroderma disease subsets, unique features, case reports, potential therapies and strategies for symptom management. As the year comes to an end, here are the top 10 articles that generated the most interest among Scleroderma News readers, as registered by total views. Here are the…

OFEV to Be Tested in Systemic Sclerosis Patients with Interstitial Lung Disease

Boehringer Ingelheim recently announced the enrollment of the first patient in the Phase 3 clinical trial SENSCIS (Safety and Efficacy of Nintedanib in Systemic SClerosIS) evaluating the safety and efficacy of the company’s product nintedanib (OFEV) in patients with systemic sclerosis and interstitial lung disease. Systemic sclerosis is a rare, chronic autoimmune…

New Biomarker Assay to Aid in Systemic Sclerosis Diagnosis

Protagen AG, a leader in the development of novel molecular diagnostics for autoimmune diseases, recently launched the Multilisa BICD2, an ELISA (enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay) that together with clinical symptoms will aid on the diagnosis of systemic sclerosis (SSc). SSc is a complex, multi-organ autoimmune disease characterized by increased fibroblast…

Scleroderma Researchers ID New, ‘Personalized’ Way of Classifying Disease

A new and promising way of classifying the debilitating autoimmune disease scleroderma has been developed by researchers in Australia. Their study, published in the journal Arthritis and Rheumatology, is titled “Interpretation of an Extended Autoantibody Profile in a Well-Characterized Australian Systemic Sclerosis (Scleroderma) Cohort Using Principal Components…

Scleroderma Patient in Long-Term Remission with TPE Treatment

A new case study revealed that long-term treatment with therapeutic plasma exchange (TPE) led to successful symptom management and disease remission in a patient with CREST syndrome, or limited systemic scleroderma. The study, recently presented at the AABB Annual Meeting in California, is entitled “Benefit of Long-Term Therapeutic Plasma…

iBio’s Anti-Fibrotic Drug Therapy Aims to Block Disease

iBio, Inc., a biotechnology company focused on developing plant-based therapies for diseases that include scleroderma, recently presented new data on the company’s anti-fibrotic drug candidate IBIO-CFB03. The data were presented at the 2015 American College of Rheumatology (ACR) annual meeting, recently held in San Francisco, California. IBIO-CFB03 is…

For Scleroderma Patients with PH, phaware365 App Is Welcome Way to Share

The nonprofit association phaware is dedicated to raising global awareness of a common complication in patients with scleroderma, the chronic lung disease known as pulmonary hypertension (PH). phaware connects with innovative technologies and industry leaders to find new paths to a PH cure and, from one of these collaborations, comes a new mobile app allowing users…