10th Annual Meeting of the Rheumatologic Dermatology Society
At the dawn of the modern era of clinical immunology in the early 1970s, a small group of predominantly-academic American dermatologists having a subspecialty interest in rheumatologic skin disease began to attend the annual national meetings of the American Rheumatism Association (ARA) in larger numbers [The ARA was re-designated as the American College of Rheumatology (ACR) in 1985].
These dermatologists would interact with ARA/ACR member rheumatologists to discuss clinical and research issues of mutual interest during the ARA/ACR-sponsored evening Skin Disease Study Group sessions. Prior to this there had been no subspecialty organizational mechanism by which American dermatologists having clinical and/or research interests in rheumatologic skin disease could interact in an ongoing basis, as modern electronic communication technology was then decades away in the future.
In 2004, the 1st International Conference on Cutaneous Lupus Erythematosus was held in Dusseldorf, Germany under the auspices of the European Society of Cutaneous Lupus Erythematous. This was such a successful and productive meeting that the American dermatologists who had attended decided to develop a similar organizational structure for North America.
Thus, in 2006 the North American Rheumatologic Dermatology Society (NARDS) came into being. This organization held annual meetings in conjunction with the annual national meeting of the ACR. However, in 2009 the NARDS membership voted to change the name of this organization to a more inclusive and modest designation—the Rheumatologic Dermatology Society (RDS). The RDS has continued to hold its annual meetings in conjunction with the ACR national meetings since then.
The RDS is committed to supporting individuals with rheumatologic skin diseases by:
- Providing patient education and access to practical information;
- Locating physicians with interest in rheumatologic skin disease;
- Getting the latest news on treatment options;
- Identifying research studies and clinical trials.
The 10th Annual National Meeting of the RDS was held at the Wyndham Grand Chicago Riverfront Hotel on October 20, 2018 in Chicago, Illinois, USA in conjunction with the annual national meeting of the ACR. At this day-long meeting, new clinically-relevant observations were presented and discussed relating to the cutaneous manifestations of the following clinical disorders: lupus erythematosus (LE), dermatomyositis, morphea, vasculitis, adult-onset Still’s disease, pyoderma gangrenosum, cutaneous ulceration, and hemophagocytic lymphohistiocytosis.
In addition, updates were presented of the ongoing efforts by subsets of RDS membership to better define/classify cutaneous LE and morphea via the Delphi technique for the purposes of future systematic clinical studies. Also, a discussion of the reliability and validity of clinical study outcome instruments such as the Cutaneous Lupus Erythematosus Disease Area and Severity Index (CLASI) was also presented.
With the authors’ permission, The Annals of Translational Medicine has kindly agreed to publish abstracts of the presentations that were given at the 2018 RDS meeting.
Acknowledgments
None.
Footnote
Conflicts of Interest: The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare.
Ethical Statement: The authors are accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved.
