Dear Colleagues,

I hope that this finds you in good health and spirits.

At the outset, I thank our esteemed IRA members who organised various events as a part of the IRA’s Rheumatology Awareness Month in April 2025. Please have a look at the special supplement of this eNewsLetter showcasing activities as reported by our members.

We all are looking forward to our flagship event IRACON 2025 which shall be held from 9^th-12^th October in New Delhi this year. You would be pleased to know that the early bird registration and abstract submission are live. The organizing team is also working hard to facilitate participation from the APLAR countries. Please do kindly spread the word and keep on visiting IRACON 2025 for updates.

The second instalment of the IRA’s webinar series “IRA eConnect 2024-2025” on 16^th April on “The Biosimilar Landscape” By Prof Joseph Smolen from Austria generated huge interest and was very well attended. I look forward to welcoming you at the next one on “Imaging in SpA” by the leading expert in this field, Prof Denis Poddubnyy from Canada, on 18^th June 2025.

It was a great academic experience and an honour to attend as an invited faculty and represent India and the IRA at RheumaPreg 2025 (the 13th International Conference on Reproduction, Pregnancy and Rheumatic Diseases) in Vienna, Austria, from 8–10 May 2025. I shared the work done by the IRA’s Reproductive Rheumatology SIG, including registries with relevant people, and hope to strengthen these initiatives soon with their inputs. Here are my highlights from this focused meeting https://touchimmunology.com/insight/rheumapreg-2025-dr-vinod-ravindrans-perspectives-and-highlights/.

The IRA strives to support rapid progress in all areas of rheumatology, including clinical care and research. A limited number of travel supports is available for rheumatology trainees or IRA members below 45 years of age who have their abstracts accepted at conferences abroad.

As a member of the IRA, you can apply for funding for your research. Please visit GRANTS (indianrheumatology.org) for more details and to apply. To propagate the awareness of rheumatic diseases among UGs and postgraduate trainees, IRA’s support is available for our members who wish to organize IRA UG-PG Rheumatology CME in teaching institutions.

Please keep visiting the Indian Journal of Rheumatology: Sage Journals (sagepub.com) to read interesting articles. Please do consider the Indian Journal of Rheumatology which is the official organ of the IRA for your next submission.

As a stakeholder, your views are very important. Please mail me your suggestions and queries at secretary@indianrheumatology.org.