The future of pediatric rheumatology starts now
A campaign to transform research, accelerate therapies, and change children’s lives
Every child with a rheumatic disease deserves a future defined not by limitations, but by possibility.
Today, CARRA is advancing bold initiatives to reshape what is possible in pediatric rheumatology.
This is the moment. Everything is converging: science, infrastructure, regulatory alignment, and clinical expertise.
Join the families, physicians, and partners helping make it happen.
“As a mom, I’ve watched Delilah face a disease most people have never even heard of. CARRA has been the one place where we felt seen, supported, and part of something bigger than our own journey. Investing in CARRA means giving kids like my daughter a future with more options, more answers, and more hope.”
85%
of CARRA expenses are for programs and services that support the mission of uniting the pediatric rheumatology community to drive research and transform the lives of children with rheumatic diseases.
The opportunity
CARRA Registry & Biorepository
Building the most advanced and largest pediatric rheumatology research engine in North America.
For more than a decade, the CARRA Registry & Biorepository has been the backbone of pediatric rheumatology research across North America. It powers safety studies, compares treatments, and follows how kids do over the long term, at a scale no other organization in North America can match.
The CARRA Registry transforms that work into a connected system that turns everyday patient data into evidence for better treatments.
Why it matters
The upgraded platform will improve data quality, make daily work easier for sites, and open the door for more families to take part through flexible, hybrid, and remote options — helping CARRA produce better real-world evidence and speed up the research needed to improve care and outcomes for children.
What your investment makes possible
- One modern system connecting patient data and biosamples from children across North America. Pediatric rheumatology has never had this.
- Connectivity to EHRs and biospecimens for faster access, higher data quality, and dramatically reduced operational friction.
- More ways for families to take part, from large academic centers to small community clinics to home.
- More accurate science regulators rely on to approve new treatments.
- A strengthened, sustainable, CARRA-owned platform that expands scientific and translational impact for decades to come.
The opportunity
Accelerating drug development for children who cannot wait
Pediatric rheumatology faces a stark reality: drug development is slow, fragmented, and often deprioritized. CARRA is bringing clinicians, researchers, industry, families, and the FDA together to remove the barriers that delay treatments for children. Today, only one medicine is FDA-approved for children with lupus, and it reached kids eight years after adults.
Your support helps build a shared, FDA-acceptable pathway that accelerates approvals and modernizes trial expectations.
No other organization in pediatric rheumatology offers this combination of infrastructure, expertise, and collaborative power.
This work will:
- Convene FDA-facing workshops to influence pediatric rheumatology drug development.
- Produce white papers and consensus statements that guide industry and regulators.
- Create shared approaches that reduce uncertainty, cost, and time.
- Integrate innovative trial designs and modern statistical approaches.
- Leverage real-world data to help more children and monitor impact after treatments reach patients.
Why CARRA is uniquely positioned
- A nearly 20-year track record of convening FDA, industry, clinicians, and families.
- Longitudinal real-world data and biospecimens across multiple diseases.
- Established relationships with pediatric rheumatology sites nationwide.
- A history of scholarship supporting pediatric drug development, and a strong pipeline of ongoing studies.
The opportunity
A once-in-a-generation chance to transform outcomes for severe pediatric rheumatic diseases
Behind every study, dataset, and breakthrough is a powerful engine: CARRA’s people, systems, and collaborative infrastructure. Across 50+ workgroups and 13 committees, clinicians, researchers, patients, and families work together to improve care, shape best practices, and respond quickly to new scientific opportunities.
Early successes using cell therapy in rheumatic and autoimmune conditions have opened a door once thought permanently closed: the possibility of durable remission without lifelong immunosuppression. For children with aggressive rheumatic diseases, the status quo is not enough. They face lifelong therapy, toxicity burdens, high cumulative costs, and persistent morbidity.
Cell therapy represents a paradigm shift, and CARRA is the only organization positioned to lead this work at scale across pediatric rheumatic diseases.
This is a rare convergence of scientific readiness, clinical urgency, and collaborative infrastructure. If we do not act now, the pediatric community risks being left behind.
Your investment will support:
- A coordinated, cross-specialty effort bringing together leaders in pediatric rheumatology, oncology, immunology, and nephrology.
- Development of pediatric-specific care models, toxicity management frameworks, and long-term follow-up systems.
- Consensus building across small patient populations to harmonize protocols and define success metrics.
- Integration with the CARRA Registry and our partnership with the FDA to support discovery and rapid execution of studies.
Why now
- Proof-of-concept success has validated the biology.
- Clinical urgency is high; children cannot wait another decade.
- Industry interest is accelerating, but companies need a trusted pediatric partner.
- Regulators are increasingly supportive of innovative therapies for rare pediatric diseases.
Your gift will:
- Accelerate life-changing therapies for children with rheumatic diseases.
- Expand equitable access to research and innovation.
- Strengthen the only national pediatric rheumatology research network of its kind.
- Build the infrastructure that will guide drug development for the next decade.
- Support breakthroughs that could redefine the trajectory of severe autoimmune disease.
Every gift, at every level, helps decide what comes next for kids with rheumatic disease.
Join us
One transformational goal: a healthier future for children.
Donors have always fueled breakthroughs in children’s health. Now, your gift can accelerate the next decade of discovery, equity, and innovation across pediatric rheumatology. Together, we can build the systems, science, and solutions children deserve.
Talk with our team
Have questions or want to talk it through? I’d love to hear from you.
Caitlin Williams
Director of Individual and Foundation Giving
CARRA is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. 85% of expenses are for programs and services.