Background: ANMAR Young is a group dedicated to young adult RMD patients. ANMAR Young Group is within ANMAR Association, the National Italian Association for RMD patients. ANMAR Young Group was born in 2015 from Transfer Knowledge Program by EULAR during the “step zero” event in Milan. That was the beginning of a long journey: “Step Zero” gave the opportunity to share experiences and ideas from already existing European Young Group realities, such as Youth-R-Well.com group from Netherlands. Being part of the ANMAR association allowed the Young Group to join many events and contributed to the evolution of the group itself. ANMAR is an official member of EULAR PARE, therefore ANMAR Young Group was born from Europe and it is still contributing and participating at European level. During the years the network of the group has increased, thanks to the collaborations with other RMD realities, in particular with SIR Young, the Young Rheumatologist group within the Italian Rheumatologist Society: SIR Young together with ANMAR Young has collaborated in recording some episodes of the webinars published online on the ANMAR Young Group Facebook page.

Objectives: ANMAR Young Group aims to increase the acknowledge about the RMD in young adult patients. The Groups gives the chance to share common experiences between people living similar situations: in example starting a new job with a new RMD condition. The age range of the group, from 18 to 35, covers in average loads of transitions episodes, such as the passage from study to job transition and from childhood care to adult care system. Another goal of the Group is to reach young people that need support: along the years the communications channels have evolved, and now Italian young people may reach ANMAR Young Group volunteers through email, Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp.

Methods: The techniques adopted by Young Group to increase the engagement and moreover the support to Young Adult RMD patients are the following:

• ANMAR Young Group Volunteers meet at least once a month for the social planning and to share ideas and thoughts about running projects.

• Peer to peer support: inside the network there is the opportunity to ask questions or to share any doubts and common thoughts.

• Whenever a person shows interest in the Young Group, a call session followed by a meeting call with all volunteers, for whom interested in volunteering, is scheduled.

• Face to face meetings for training and brainstorming.

Results: The achieved targets for the ANMAR Young Group are the following:

• The number of active volunteers has increased, from around 2-3 active people, up to around ten volunteers today.

• The number of followers on Instagram has increased during the years, in example starting from 150 followers in 2022 to more than 300 followers in 2025: more than twice the starting value.

• The interaction on social media has increased, because of the increasing of the followers: more people interact in DM and replies on the published posts.

• Post contents has increased during the years, with more topic discussed leading to a wider content spread.

• Many volunteers of the ANMAR Group have joined the EULAR Young Pare working Group as well, and they have joined many European events (such as EULAR PARE Conferences and Congresses), thanks to the special interaction with the European League since the birth of the Italian group.

Conclusion: During the years the ANMAR Young Group visibility is increased, thus leading to a higher possibility to the audience to reach the ANMAR Young Group. During the years the group has improved the acknowledge on RMD conditions in young adult age, therefore it has increased the opportunity of relationship with the audience. The possibility to help young people who suffer an RMD condition has increased, especially during the diagnosis and at the beginning of the therapy, when people show more interest to find a support.

REFERENCES: NIL.

Numbers and trends analysis are part of the internal evaluation by young group volunteers.

The topics and the contents are discussed during the planning sessions of ANMAR Young Group.

Acknowledgements: NIL.

Disclosure of Interests: None declared.

© The Authors 2025. This abstract is an open access article published in Annals of Rheumatic Diseases under the CC BY-NC-ND license ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ ). Neither EULAR nor the publisher make any representation as to the accuracy of the content. The authors are solely responsible for the content in their abstract including accuracy of the facts, statements, results, conclusion, citing resources etc.