About Us

Who We Are

We are a non-profit organization that gives families afflicted by rare genetic disorders access to genome sequencing and expert analysis. We bring together scientists who share our passion for helping rare disease patients and leverage the crowdfunding capabilities of the Internet to bring the hope of a cure to our patients.

Why We Care

An estimated 250 million people worldwide suffer from rare diseases. However, because each individual disease affects such a small number of people, little funding is used to study these conditions. Consequently, these patients are left with neither hope of a cure nor understanding of the disease. Each day is a living struggle for them to find a social identity in a world where they feel socially neglected and lost.

What We Do

Because most rare diseases are genetic in nature, we believe that genome sequencing has the power to help these patients in a way that conventional diagnostics cannot. However, most families affected with rare diseases are under financial strain, making access to such technologies difficult. To address this need, we act as a hub to help families raise funds and connect them to scientists who can help them.

How We Do It

We recruited a number of researchers and clinicians from top research institutions around the world. Through us, patients can gain access to world-class genomic sequencing and interpretation services at a much lower cost compared to commercially-equivalent solutions. We also provide a fundraising platform to help patients raise funds.

Where the Funds Go

We are a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization, funded primarily through the generosity of donors who believe in our cause. 100% of donated funds go directly to supporting patient-specific research. We also raise funds through other means, such as grants from academic institutions, foundations, private donations, and other financial sponsors. We are incredibly thankful to everyone who has given us their support and made it possible for us to do what we do.

Being Rare Doesn't Mean Being Alone.
For Patients
Learn about how to get a campaign going and get started towards finding a cure
For Donors
Find out how you can help change the life of an individual rare disease patient
For Researchers
Help us overcome barriers so that our patients can benefit from cutting-edge discoveries

The Case for Our Cause

Nature Front Cover

A Father's Love

Hugh Reinhoff is an MD who trained at Johns Hopkins and went on to be a successful venture capitalist in California. In 2003, his daughter, Beatrice, was born with unusually long feet and clawed fingers. Because of his clinical background, he knew immediately that she might have inherited a genetic disease. He initially suspected that it might have been Marfan's Syndrome, but tests for this condition turned out negative. Despite consulting with some of the world's top geneticists, no diagnosis was found.

Taking matters into his own hands, Reinhoff used his venture capital connections to get his daughter's DNA sequenced. From there, he was able to identify a strong candidate gene called copine, which is involved in a growth factor signaling pathway (TGF-β). This discovery enabled Beatrice's doctors to treat her with an existing drug, losartan, which was used to prevent cardiac complications that arose from other diseases caused by defects in this pathway.

This type of activism is not uncommon. Parents such as Reinhoff frequently become involved as passionate advocates for research because of their children. Reinhoff was able to do all of this because of his specialized training and venture capital connections. But for many other parents, this is not the case. Lack of knowledge, lack of connections, and lack of resources stop many parents right in their tracks, and prevent them from ever having hope of finding a cure.

But it shouldn't be like this.

Biomedical researchers have the capabilities and the resources to help patients sequence their genomes in the hopes of finding a cure. What they lack are patients.

Internet, powered by social media, has the capability to quickly spread a single message out to hundreds of millions of people who want to help others. What they lack is a worthy cause.

The Rare Genomics Institute intends to bridge this gap and make genome sequencing available to rare disease patients who can benefit from this information.

We're here to change things around.

Want to learn more about Hugh's story? Click here to read the full article from Nature magazine.