With the wind in her hair and a smile on her face, a young girl flies through the air on the zip line at Camp Wekandu. She waves to her fellow campers on the ground and offers a thumbs up before the ride ends and one of the camp counselors lowers her from the zip…
Working for Children with Rheumatic Diseases
Pediatric rheumatology was formally recognized as a specialty in 1991 by the American Board of Pediatrics. Prior to this time, children with rheumatic diseases were treated by a hodgepodge of providers. In addition to providers who had training as pediatric rheumatologists, general pediatricians, adult rheumatologists, allergist-immunologists, orthopedists, pediatric infectious disease specialists and others treated children…
Approximately 50% of young adult patients with childhood-onset rheumatic diseases become lost to follow-up within the first year of transferring to adult rheumatology care, mirroring the statistics of other subspecialties.1,2 One of the challenges cited most consistently by young adult patients and their families relates to differences between rheumatology care delivery in the pediatric and…