News

June is awareness month for scleroderma, and this year’s theme chosen by the National Scleroderma Foundation is “Every Journey Matters,” to recognize the unique ways in which each person in the community experiences the disease. To encourage people to stay engaged in the lead-up to World Scleroderma…

Anti-SSA self-reactive antibodies, a hallmark of Sjögren’s syndrome, are associated with a higher risk of organ involvement in people with scleroderma, including the lungs and skin, a study in Japan shows. The findings suggest “anti-SSA may be a valuable biomarker of organ involvement and skin severity in patients…

Local injection with botulinum toxin type A (BTX-A), such as Botox, may ease the severity of pain associated with Raynaud’s phenomenon in people with scleroderma, also known as systemic sclerosis, a meta-analysis study found. The study, “Efficacy and safety of botulinum toxin in treating scleroderma-associated raynaud’s phenomenon: a…

Anemia is found in almost 20% of people with systemic sclerosis (SSc) and is associated with an almost two times higher risk of death, a French study reports. Iron deficiency was the most common reason for anemia in SSc, with older patients and those with diffuse cutaneous SSc…

Researchers have developed a model for predicting which systemic sclerosis (SSc) patients with interstitial lung disease (ILD) — together known as SSc-ILD — will experience progressive lung function declines that are known to be associated with a poorer prognosis. The prediction algorithm accounts for nine clinical factors, including…

Having scleroderma increases the risk of developing diseases affecting blood vessels of the brain or heart, known as cerebrovascular and cardiovascular diseases, a review study found. Relative to controls, the risk of stroke — caused by poor blood flow to the brain — in scleroderma patients was 64% higher,…

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has granted orphan drug status to BLR-200, a medication that BLR Bio — a company stemming from the Helix 51 biomedical incubator at Rosalind Franklin University — is developing for scleroderma. According to Ronald Kaplan, PhD, the…

Levels of two blood proteins, calcitonin and SOST, may be markers of lung disease in people with scleroderma, a new study shows. “This study indicates that serum calcitonin and SOST levels are promising biomarkers for [scleroderma]-related PAH [pulmonary arterial hypertension] and ILD [interstitial lung disease], respectively,” the researchers wrote, though…

People with scleroderma who feel more socially isolated are more likely to report being dissatisfied with life, but this association is partially attenuated in those who show more resilience, according to a recent study. Resilience refers to the ability to adapt to and recover from challenging life experiences, such…

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has granted orphan drug designation to Cabaletta Bio’s cell therapy CABA-201 as a treatment for adults with hard-to-treat systemic sclerosis (SSc), or scleroderma. Orphan drug designation is intended to support the accelerated development of investigational treatments for rare diseases, defined as…