Rosa Maria Rodrigues Pereira, Full Professor at the Faculdade de Medicina da Universidade de São Paulo (FMUSP), died on October 3rd, aged 63. It is an irreparable loss for everyone who worked and lived with his youthful, tireless and fraternal spirit. But at the same time, it's time to transform the sadness of her loss into a willingness to celebrate her extensive personal and scientific legacy.

Rosa graduated in Medicine in 1982, at FMUSP, where she carried out her Medical Residency in Internal Medicine and Rheumatology (1983-1986) and also defended her Master's (1990) and Doctorate (1996) in Rheumatology. Subsequently, she did her postdoctoral work at the Saint Francis Hospital and Medical Center at the University of Connecticut (1998-2001) and became a Lecturer Professor in 2005. Finally, capping off her brilliant academic career, she became a Full Professor of Rheumatology at USP in 2014.

A deep advocate of multidisciplinarity and the joint work of different medical specialties, she was head of the Department of Internal Medicine at USP between 2016 and 2020, having also coordinated its Teaching Committee for several years. In the spirit of sharing knowledge, she coordinated and actively participated in the monthly meetings of the Internal Medicine Department for several years, until her death. In another important academic activity to train young rheumatologists, she spent weekly visits to the Rheumatology Ward together with the resident physicians.

His areas of special interest were pediatric rheumatology, vasculitides and especially osteometabolic diseases. At a time when the study of bone metabolism was just beginning to arouse interest, she implemented and directed the Laboratory of Bone Metabolism at the University of São Paulo with enormous dedication. During her solid academic trajectory, she has published 370 original articles, 85 book chapters, 8 books and won more than 80 national and international awards, which attest to the excellence of her work. Rosa has served on the board of several scientific publications, currently highlighting, among others, her participation in the International Advisory Board of The Lancet Rheumatology and as Regional Editor of the Journal of Bone and Mineral Research.

The Covid-19 pandemic has heavily affected Brazil. In these difficult times, she acted firmly to keep the Hospital das Clínicas of Faculdade de Medicina of USP functioning, encouraging and participating in the virtual activities of our institution, always working to reinforce the spirit and willingness to work of the teams. Even when her health began to deteriorate, she was always active in scientific activities, continuing to guide her numerous graduate students with her traditional scientific rigor until the end.

Rosa was married to Ricardo, a companion for many years and a great stimulator of her professional career. She had in her family a reference of life and immeasurable personal and professional reception. She had a crowd of advisees, which included 49 Master's students, 91 Doctoral students, 22 Scientific Initiation students and 7 Post-Doctoral students, who always constituted a noisy group of young people around her at all events.

In conclusion, she has lived an intense scientific life, spreading the knowledge of Rheumatology and making countless friends during the last four decades. At the last scientific event in which she participated, the Brazilian Congress of Rheumatology 2022, which took place three weeks before her death, many friends commented that, despite her fragile physical appearance, she was radiant with all that she had achieved. This was Rosa, a friend and rheumatologist who will be remembered forever!

Colleagues of the Discipline of Rheumatology