In 2003, a group of seventeen rheumatologists from across Canada, under the direction of Dr. Murray Baron, came together and acknowledged the need to unite to better treat patients with scleroderma. Dr. Baron is a rheumatologist with over 20 years of clinical and organizational experience. Since 1982, he has established the rheumatology program at the Jewish General Hospital in Montreal, created and supervised the Rheumatic Disease Unit of at the Jewish Rehabilitation Hospital, and has directed the McGill Scleroderma Clinic.
The group's ultimate goal is to increase the capacity to perform research in Canada by creating a multidisciplinary, cross pillar team to perform high impact scleroderma research. They work with scientists from inside and outside the field of scleroderma (mainly rheumatologists, cardiologists, lung specialists, gastroenterologists, dermatologists, dentists, psychologists, and epidemiologists) and train new scientists in relevant scleroderma research. Currently, their main focus is to develop more sensitive classification criteria, create subsets of disease using, among other things, autoantibody profiles, and develop a disease activity index and a damage index. They also intend to engage in active knowledge transfer and exchange among the important stakeholders, namely the scientific and lay communities and the policy makers. They have developed links with well-recognized patient groups, such as Scleroderma Society of Canada and Sclérodermie Québec, in order to involve patients in determining priorities and disseminating knowledge.