They’re the cold cases of medicine, patients with diseases so rare and mysterious that they’ve eluded diagnosis for years.
The National Institutes of Health is seeking those patients — and ones who qualify could get some free care at the government’s top research hospital as scientists study why they’re sick.
The pilot program, announced Monday, can recruit only about 100 patients a year. But federal health officials hope that unraveling some of these super-rare diseases in turn will provide clues to more common illnesses.
Candidates must be referred to the NIH by a doctor, who must send all medical files for evaluation. Accepted patients will undergo up to a week’s additional testing for free.
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