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RHEUMATOLOGY AND THE LUNGS
Author(s) -
PIERCE JOHN A.
Publication year - 1968
Publication title -
journal of the american geriatrics society
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.992
H-Index - 232
eISSN - 1532-5415
pISSN - 0002-8614
DOI - 10.1111/j.1532-5415.1968.tb02090.x
Subject(s) - medicine , rheumatoid arthritis , interstitial lung disease , lung , juvenile rheumatoid arthritis , pulmonary fibrosis , rheumatoid nodule , pathology , lung biopsy , rheumatology , fibrosis , arthritis
A bstract : The relationship between rheumatoid arthritis and lung disease is discussed. A case is presented of a young woman with juvenile rheumatoid arthritis in whom the lung disease progressed from a highly cellular lymphocytic interstitial pneumonitis (biopsy) to dense diffuse fibrosis within five years. A survey of the records of 702 patients with rheumatoid arthritis showed that 8 had diffuse lung fibrosis. The arthritis usually preceded the pulmonary lesion. There was no correlation between the severity of the arthritis and the severity of the lung fibrosis. Rheumatoid lung disease encompasses a wide range of pathologic alterations, varying from insignificant fibrous pleural adhesions to progressive and fatal diffuse fibrosis. The high frequency of lung disease in rheumatoid patients suggests that the rheumatoid process is essential or at least important to its causation, but the lack of correlation between the intensity of the arthritis and the severity of the lung disease suggests that the rheumatoid process alone is not responsible for the lung involvement. The exceptional reactivity of the lung tissue in patients with rheumatoid disease makes it reasonable to propose that ordinary pathogenic stimuli, particularly viral and bacterial infections, may provoke an intense response and, ultimately, severe lesions of the lung in the rheumatoid patient.