Prologue: 2020 Annual Meeting of the Group for Research and Assessment of Psoriasis and Psoriatic Arthritis (GRAPPA)

Abstract

The Group for Research and Assessment of Psoriasis and Psoriatic Arthritis (GRAPPA) held its annual meeting in 2020 in an online format due to travel restrictions during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‑19; caused by SARS-CoV-2) pandemic. The virtual meeting was attended by 351 rheumatologists, dermatologists, representatives of biopharmaceutical companies, and patient research partners. Similar to previous years, GRAPPA’s annual meeting focused on the 3 overlapping missions of education, research, and clinical care of psoriatic disease. Trainee sessions this year included the annual trainee symposium and a grant-writing workshop. Plenary sessions included updates on COVID-19 and psoriatic disease from multispecialty and patient perspectives, and updates on pustular psoriasis and associated musculoskeletal manifestations. Progress on research and updates were presented for the following groups: Collaborative Research Network, Outcome Measures in Rheumatology (OMERACT) Psoriatic Arthritis Working Group, International Dermatology Outcome Measures, Composite Measures, Education Committee, and Treatment Guidelines. New this year were 3 concurrent workshops on ultrasound assessment of joints and entheses, magnetic resonance imaging of psoriatic arthritis, and pustular psoriasis efficacy endpoints; 6 “Meet the Expert” sessions; and facilitated “poster tours.” In our prologue, we introduce the papers that summarize this meeting.

Prologue: 2021 Annual Meeting of the Group for Research and Assessment of Psoriasis and Psoriatic Arthritis (GRAPPA)

“…Reports of previous annual meetings have been published elsewhere. [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12] As is customary, the meeting kicked off with the GRAPPA trainee symposium. This session consisted of 5 presentations by rheumatology and dermatology trainees and included the following topics: prediction of cardiovascular events in psoriatic disease (PsD), correlation between spine abnormalities and clinical findings, biomechanical stress as a trigger for psoriatic arthritis (PsA), differences in DNA methylation among twins with PsD, and critical proteins associated with induction of PsD.…”