Although most systemic juvenile idiopathic arthritis patients don’t develop macrophage activation syndrome (MAS), the approximately 10% who do have this serious complication can experience widespread, massive inflammation, debilitating symptoms and even death. To improve understanding of MAS among physicians and advance efforts to develop effective therapies to treat it, a panel of 28 international pediatric…
FDA Restricts Fluoroquinolone Use The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has twice previously communicated safety information about systemic fluoroquinolones—in August 2013 and July 2008. The safety issues of this medication class described in its latest Drug Safety Communication were also discussed at a November 2015 FDA Advisory Committee meeting.1 The FDA is now advising…
CHICAGO—Despite the complicated politics surrounding medical marijuana, cannabis has a wide variety of medical benefits and potential benefits, but the risks need to be understood, said Daniel Clauw, MD, director of the Chronic Pain and Fatigue Research Center at the University of Michigan, in a session at the ACR’s 2016 State-of-the-Art Clinical Symposium. Effects It’s…
SAN FRANCISCO—The Kveim-Siltzbach skin test for a diagnosis of sarcoidosis was developed in 1941, then popularized in 1961. Since then, the knowledge base about the disease has not expanded much, said Kristin Highland, MD, who has dual appointments at Cleveland Clinic’s Respiratory Institute and Orthopedics and Rheumatology Institute. “We don’t know a whole lot more…
The problem that dogs the work of all of those treating patients with antiphospholipid syndrome (APS) is the apparent lack of knowledge of the syndrome, both by the general public, as well as by swaths of the medical fraternity. Perhaps it was ever thus—a syndrome less than 40 years old could be described as new,…
SAN FRANCISCO—Behçet’s disease is a vasculitis that can be hard to pin down, with a wide variety of manifestations, many of which overlap with other auto-inflammatory conditions, an expert said at a clinical review course at the 2015 ACR/ARHP Annual Meeting. The most common feature is oral ulcers, which are expected to be seen at…
SAN FRANCISCO—Let’s say your radiologist comes to you and says that an angiogram gives a diagnosis of CNS vasculitis on four patients, all with acute onset of headache and stroke: One is a 25-year-old woman who is three months pregnant. Another is a 50-year-old man using excessive doses of nasal decongestants. Another is a 40-year-old…
The FDA recently approved a form of naloxone hydrochloride in a nasal spray that will help counter opioid overdoses. The FDA also approved an ibuprofen injection as an adjunct to opioids for use in children 6 months and older…
Despite a generation of advances in molecular biology, a huge gap exists between the Sjögren’s syndrome (SS) patient’s description of their symptoms and the objective findings. Current issues include: Many SS patients are misclassified as either rheumatoid arthritis (RA) or systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), even within rheumatology clinics. Frequently, the sickest SS patients with extraglandular…
Recent updates to criteria used for diagnosing neuromyelitis optica (NMO) are aimed at helping physicians make the differential diagnosis of this disorder differentiating it from other inflammatory disorders—a diagnosis that can be difficult given the presenting symptoms that can mimic a number of other conditions, such as multiple sclerosis. Published in July 2015, the new…