CoRDS Cast

In this episode, Alyssa and Polly sat down with Carol Roberts from the PBCers Organization.  You'll hear Carol share information on her organization and her journey as a rare disease patient diagnosed with Primary Biliary Cholangitis (PBC) which leads to cirrhosis of the liver.  Carol will lead us though her experience as an advocacy leader and a patient.  We hope you enjoy!

In this episode, Alyssa speaks with Stacey Reason and Andrew Wakelin with the IamGSD organization.  Stacey and Andrew are both diagnosed with one of the muscle GSDs that we cover in this episode, McArdle disease.  You'll hear about their advocacy efforts through IamGSD and learn about the diesease from their perspectives as patients.  Enjoy!

In this episode Alyssa sat down with Christal Delagrammatikas with the Malan Syndrome Foundation, and Dr. Richard Gronostajski who is the Director of the genetics, genomics & Bioinformatics Graduate Program at the University of Buffalo.

Christal connected with Dr. Gronostajski which got him involved with Malan syndrome and further research. Here, you'll learn more about Malan syndrome and the efforts behind it as we dive deeper into the pod cast.

In this episode, Alyssa and Polly spoke with Nathan Peck, the founder of Cure VCP Disease, Inc. and with Dr. Chris Weihl, a professor of Neurology at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.  VCP disease is a complex degenerative disorder that involves multiple aspects ranging from muscle fatigue to dementia.  In this discussion, you'll learn about current research, the role and impacts patients have on therapy development, and get to hear from two of the men fighting to raise awareness.  Enjoy!  

In this episode, Alyssa and Polly interviewed Wendy Giebink and Mallory Kloucek from the South Dakota chapter of NAMI, the National Alliance on Mental Illness.  While not often discussed, mental illness and rare disease may go hand in hand - especially in cases of depression and anxiety.  Here, Wendy and Mallory discuss the free programming offered by NAMI to provide education and counseling to those living with mental illness.  Hope comes through talking about struggles, and out of hope comes healing.  We hope you enjoy!

In this episdode, we met with co-founders, Seth Rotberg and Kristina Wolfe, to discuss their newly founded organization called Our Odyssey.  The foundation serves the needs of young adults living with rare and/or chronic conditions.  Together, Seth and Kristina have a vision for meeting the overall needs of this niche community within the rare and chronic healthcare space.  This is an information packed episode - enjoy!

For more information on Our Odyssey, visit them at www.ourodyssey.org.

In this joint podcast episode, Ben visited with Megan Meyer and Matty Manley, both moms to children living with a congenital muscular dystrophy (CMD).  You may know Megan and Matty from their podcast, "Two Rare Mama Bears," and we were so excited when they asked us to do a joint episode!  You'll hear discussion about summer weather in the midwest, the flow of events during Rare Disease Week on Capitol Hill, the mission of Cure CMD, and a bit about the CoRDS Registry too.  We hope you enjoy this episode - and be sure to subscribe to Matty and Megan's podcast at curecmd.org/podcast.  

In this second part of Episode 14, Ben met once again with Dr. Sotirios Keros.  On this interview, they were joined by Breteni Morgan-Berg, the mother of Kamiyah, a patient living with a mutation in the KCNMA1 gene.  You'll hear a powerful story of a family's life on the diagnostic odyssey, finding a diagnosis, and Breteni's relentless effort to do everything she can for her daughter.

In part one of this two-part episode, Ben and Alyssa interviewed Dr. Sotirios Keros.  He is a passionate pediatric neurologist with a background in neuroscience research.  Through his clinical experience, Dr. Keros has become involved in research into a family of disorders related to mutations in the KCNMA1 gene.  In this episode, you'll learn about the gene and related disorders, current research in the space, and a unique perspective on patient advocacy from a very passionate physician scientist.  Enjoy!

In this episode, Austin and Ben spent some time with Jaime Husher from Sanford Health's Health Information Management Department.  Sanford HIM is responsible for maintaining and distributing each patient's medical record.  Jaime provides great insight into working with multiple healthcare systems to retrieve records, making effective requests for information, and ensuring that you have everything you need to take to a new clinic appointment.  This episode is packed with great information on a very important topic!  Enjoy!