Marcela A. Ferrada, MD

Marcela Ferrada, M.D., earned her medical degree at the Universidad del Valle in Cali, Colombia. She completed her internal medicine residency at the University of Miami/Jackson Memorial Hospital, where she also spent one year as chief resident. She completed a dual fellowship in critical care medicine at the National Institutes of Health and in infectious diseases at Johns Hopkins Hospital.

In 2015, Dr. Ferrada was diagnosed with relapsing polychondritis, a rare inflammatory rheumatic disorder. After her diagnosis she changed her career focus to studying this disease. She completed a rheumatology fellowship at the NIH’s National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases.

Dr. Ferrada is board certified in internal medicine, critical care, infectious diseases, and rheumatology. She is a member of the Alpha Omega Alpha honor medical society at the University of Miami. She is the recipient of several awards, including the Distinguished Fellow Award from the American College of Rheumatology in 2018, the Outstanding Research Award from the Rheumatism Society of the District of Columbia in 2018, the Lawrence Shulman Scholar Award in 2019, and the NIH Director's Award in 2021.

Dr. Ferrada was pivotal in recruiting and evaluating patients on the first available prospective cohort of patients with relapsing polychondritis at NIH and has become a world leader in the field.

Currently Dr. Ferrada is the Director of the Relapsing Polychondritis and VEXAS Program at the University of Maryland.

vexas, relapsing polychondritis, rheumatology, clinical immunology, somatic mutations in UBA1

Ferrada MA, Savic S, Cardona D, et al. Translation of Cytoplasmic UBA1 Contributes to VEXAS Syndrome Pathogenesis. Blood. 2022 Sep 29;140(13):1496-1506

Topillo JS, Ospina Cardon D, Beck DB, Ferrada MA, et al. Novel Genetic Mutation in Myositis-Variant of VEXAS Syndrome

Heiblig M, Ferrada MA, Koster MJ, Barba T et al. Ruxolitinib is More Effective than other JACK Inhibitors to treat VEXAS Syndrome: A retrospective Multicenter Study. Blood Aug 25, 2022

PC Grayson, DB Beck, Ferrada MA, PA Nigrovic and DL Kastner VEXAS Syndrome and Disease Taxonomy in Rheumatology. Notes from the Field. Arthritis & Rheumatology June 12, 2022

Luo Y, Bolek EC, Quinn KA, Wells K, Rose R, Sikora K, Goodspeed W, Rominger E, Kilic L, Karadag O, Clark C, Livinski AA, Grayson PC and Ferrada MA. A Prospective Observational Cohort Study and Systemactic Review of 40 Patients with Mouth and Genital Ulcers with Inflamed Cartilage (MAGIC) Syndrome. Semin Arthritis Rheum Nov 14, 2021

Rose E, Ferrada MA, Quin KA et al. Discordance in Patient and Physician Global Assessment in Relapsing Polychondritis. Rheumatology 2021 Sep 24.

Ferrada MA, Sikora KA, Luo Y et al. Somatic Mutations in UBA1 Define a Distinct Subset of Relapsing Polychondritis with VEXAS. Arthtritis Rheumatol. 2021 Oct; 73(10):1886-1895

Rose E, Ferrada MA, Quin KA et al. Physician Global Assessment as a Disease Activity Measure for Relapsing Polychondritis.Arthritis Care Res. 2021 Feb 5.

Patel BE, Ferrada MA, Grayson PC and Beck DB. VEXAS syndrome: An inflammatory and hematologic disease. Semi Hematol. 2021 Oct; 58(4):201-203

D Beck, MA Ferrada, KA Sikora, AK Ombrello et al. Somatic Mutationsin UBA1 and Severe Adult-Onset Autoinflammaory Disease. N Engl J Med. 2020 Dec 3

M Schwarts, C Rimland, K Quinn, MA Ferrada et al. Utility of the Brief Illness Perception Questionnaire to Monitor Patient Beliefs in Systemic Vasculitis. J Rheumatol. 2020 Dec 1;47 (12):1785-1792

MA Ferrada, CA Rimland, K Quinn et al. Defining Clinical Subgroups in Relapsing Polychondritis: A Prospective Observational Cohort Study. Arthritis Rheumatol. 2020. Aug; 71 (8): 1396-1402

DP D’Cruz and MA Ferrada. Relapsing Polychondritis and Large-vessel Vasculitis. J Rheumatol. 2020 Dec 1;47 (12):1732-1733

CA Rimland, MA Ferrada, N Sinnai et al. Patient-perceived Burden of Disease in Pediatric Relapsing Polychondritis. J Rheumatol. 2019 Dec; 46 (12):1627-1633

S Gupta, MA Ferrada, SA Hasni. Pulmonary Manifestations of Primary Sjogren’s Syndrome: Underlying Immunological Mechanisms, Clinical Presentation, and Management. Front Immunol. 2019 June 12; 10:1327

 MA Ferrada, PC Grayson, S Banerjee S, Sikora K, Colbert R, Sinaii N, Katz JD. Patient-Perception of Disease-Related Symptoms and Complications in Relapsing Polychondritis. Arthritis Care Res. 2018 Aug; 70(8):1124-1131

MA Ferrada. Relapsing Polychondritis is a lung disease. My Story. Ann Am Thorac Soc. 2017 Dec 28