June 2022 Marks Scleroderma Awareness Month

"Know Scleroderma" is the National Scleroderma Foundation's theme for this year's Scleroderma Awareness Month.

 June is Scleroderma Awareness Month, and "Know Scleroderma" is the National Scleroderma Foundation's theme for 2022.

Throughout the month, the Foundation will post videos and photos of individuals affected by scleroderma on its Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn social media accounts.  

The campaign highlights the Foundation's belief that to know scleroderma is to understand the impact of a rare disease that is life-threatening for many and can cause physical disabilities and change lives forever. Featured in the campaign is recording artist Ashley Barron, who was diagnosed with localized scleroderma at age 5, and is the Foundation's Celebrity Ambassador.

"To know scleroderma is to make individuals with scleroderma feel seen and understood," says Barron in a news release.  "When I was diagnosed, I had never heard of scleroderma before. I didn't know anybody who had scleroderma. I didn't know there were any resources out there. It was just my parents and I trying to navigate this journey."

Also featured in the Know Scleroderma campaign are preeminent physicians and researchers Virginia D. Steen, MD, Georgetown University, John Varga, MD, University of Michigan, and Carol Feghali-Bostwick, PhD, Medical University of South Carolina.

Awareness month is punctuated on June 29 by World Scleroderma Day, which commemorates Paul Klee, a gifted, abstract artist who died of systemic sclerosis on June 29, 1940. Klee's paintings were strongly influenced by his illness.