Systemic lupus erythematosus affects more than 1.5 million Americans, yet 63% of patients are misdiagnosed before receiving the correct diagnosis. For Lupus Awareness Month, we are sharing real voices from the Smart Patients lupus community describing what it’s like to live between what the labs say and what the body knows.

For fourteen years, Robin has shown up every single day for patients and caregivers navigating serious illness — contributing nearly 53,000 posts to the Smart Patients community. Her journey from cancer caregiver to trusted peer support leader is a testament to what happens when lived experience meets purpose.

Anticipatory grief is one of caregiving's most universal yet least recognized experiences. This conversation with experts from the Family Caregiver Alliance explores how caregivers can recognize and name this quiet, accumulating grief, and what small, practical steps can help them find support before burnout takes hold.

Every year, nearly 83,000 Americans are diagnosed with bladder cancer — and most will face it more than once. This Bladder Cancer Awareness Month, we're sharing the words of the people living it.

For the estimated 4 million Americans living with Sjögren's disease, the path to diagnosis is rarely straightforward — and the care that follows isn't always better. For Sjögren's Awareness Month, we asked two doctors three questions that don't always make it into the appointment.

What does chronic illness actually look like from the inside — not clinically, but on a random Tuesday afternoon when you're figuring it out alone? The latest Living With It conversation gathered the accumulated tools of people who have learned to stay in motion when circumstances would rather stop them.

In recognition of Oral, Head and Neck Cancer Awareness Week, Smart Patients attended Stanford's 2026 Head and Neck Cancer Patient and Caregiver Education Symposium. From rising HPV-related oral cancer rates to the debate over surgery vs. radiation for oropharyngeal cancer, here are the key takeaways.

Parkinson's disease is hard to diagnose and even harder to manage day to day. This April, for Parkinson's Awareness Month, we are sharing the unfiltered voices of patients and caregivers who know exactly what that means.

K has been living with kidney cancer since 2008. In that time, she has outlasted more than a handful of surgeries, a clinical trial gone wrong, and a depression that nearly swallowed her whole. Through it all, she holds a quiet certainty that life is good.

Esophageal cancer affects thousands of Americans each year, yet remains one of the most under-recognized cancers in the country. Meet the Smart Patients community that is changing that — one Zoom call, one conversation, one diagnosis at a time.

When Pete Ramsey received his stage 4 kidney cancer diagnosis eight years ago, doctors told him he might never walk without a limp or play golf again. Today, he's first in line for a promising clinical trial, and showing others what resilience looks like when you refuse to stop asking "what's next?"

Sometimes the most important thing a community can do is stop a conversation mid-sentence. That's exactly what happened when Smart Patients launched Living With It. It turns out, getting it wrong is sometimes how you get it right.

Colorectal cancer is now one of the deadliest cancers for adults under 50, and the blue flags planted across the National Mall this March make that impossible to ignore. But awareness grows not just through advocacy — it grows every time a patient shares their story and helps someone else feel less alone.

After ASH 2025, Smart Patients translated six hematology studies into plain-language summaries and opened them up for community discussion. Here's what patients wanted to know — and what the conversations revealed.

What happens when your brain is covered in lesions, you can barely walk, and you continue to wait for a diagnosis? This MS Awareness Month, we're telling the story of the diagnostic wilderness, based on the lived-experiences of this Smart Patients community.

World Obesity Day, observed each March 4, is a global call to recognize obesity as a complex chronic disease affecting more than a billion people worldwide. Yet, behind those numbers are personal stories—patients navigating stigma, complex medical realities, and a complicated healthcare system. Understanding these stories is an important step for improving care.

When Joyce Graff's husband was diagnosed with Von Hippel-Lindau (VHL) disease in the 1960s, only 16 medical articles had been published about the condition in the past century. Fifty years later, Joyce has co-founded the VHL Alliance, created the VHL Handbook, and connected thousands of VHL families worldwide. This is her story—and a reminder that some of the most powerful rare disease advocacy begins with a caregiver who refuses to let others face what she faced alone.

Yesterday was National Family Caregivers Day. To honor their often unseen work, we're resharing three caregiver stories from our community. One is about invisible labor, one about a reshaped life, and one about the emotional tightrope caregivers walk every day. Together, they add up to reveal the weight caregivers carry—not just tasks, but love, grief, vigilance, and adaptation all at once.

Patient communities provide peer support from people who understand what it's like to navigate diagnosis, treatment decisions, and life-altering choices. Read this story to see how love shows up in Smart Patients through connection and caring.

February is Cholangiocarcinoma Awareness Month, a time to spotlight the realities of living with this rare and often late-diagnosed cancer. In this I Am story, patients share what it means to live “stable but uncertain,” navigating treatment decisions, limited options, and the critical need for clear communication and shared decision-making.