For Immediate Release

MyCARE Foundation Awarded Funding to Build National Capacity for Patient-Centered Comparative Clinical Effectiveness Research in Fungal Diseases

Eugene Washington PCORI Engagement Award will support a national initiative to prepare patients, caregivers, clinicians, researchers, and stakeholder organizations to participate as meaningful research partners.

Colorado Springs, Colorado | July 23, 2026

The MyCARE Foundation has been approved for a funding award through the Eugene Washington PCORI Engagement Award Program, an initiative of the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI). The award will support Building Capacity to Engage in Patient-Centered CER on Fungal Diseases, a national initiative designed to strengthen patient-centered comparative clinical effectiveness research by preparing patients, caregivers, clinicians, researchers, and advocacy organizations to engage as meaningful research partners.

Rob Purdie, Co-Founder and Managing Director of MyCARE Foundation and Project Lead, will lead the initiative. The project will focus on building sustainable national infrastructure that enables patients, caregivers, clinicians, researchers, and advocacy organizations to work together in patient-centered comparative clinical effectiveness research for fungal diseases.

Why It Matters

Although fungal diseases affect large numbers of people each year, they have historically received far less attention than many other serious conditions. As a result, the perspectives of patients and caregivers have too often been absent from research planning, clinical care, and policy discussions.

This project is designed to help change that by ensuring that lived experience informs future research and that the outcomes most important to patients remain central to research design, implementation, and dissemination.

Project Highlights

• Establish a national fungal disease engagement network.
• Develop educational resources and training in patient-centered comparative clinical effectiveness research.
• Equip patients and caregivers to serve as research partners and advisors.
• Provide researchers and clinicians with tools and training to support meaningful patient engagement.
• Include patients and caregivers with lived experience across a range of serious fungal diseases in leadership and advisory roles.

“We are honored to have the opportunity to help build a stronger future for people affected by fungal diseases. For too long, the experiences of patients and caregivers have not been fully represented in research. This project will help ensure that their voices, priorities, and lived experiences play a central role in shaping future patient-centered comparative clinical effectiveness research.”

— Rob Purdie, Co-Founder and Managing Director of MyCARE Foundation and Project Lead

About the Funding Award

The Building Capacity to Engage in Patient-Centered CER on Fungal Diseases project is part of a portfolio of projects funded by PCORI to help develop communities of patients, caregivers, clinicians, researchers, and other stakeholders who are better equipped to engage as partners throughout all phases of patient-centered comparative clinical effectiveness research and to disseminate the results of PCORI-funded studies.

PCORI is a nonprofit organization with a mission to fund patient-centered comparative clinical effectiveness research that provides patients and those who care for them with evidence to make better-informed healthcare decisions.

About MyCARE Foundation

MyCARE Foundation is a patient-led nonprofit organization dedicated to improving outcomes for individuals affected by fungal diseases through advocacy, research, education, and patient engagement. Through partnerships with patients, clinicians, researchers, public health agencies, and policymakers, MyCARE works to increase awareness and advance solutions that improve diagnosis, treatment, and quality of life.

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