Gastrointestinal and Hepatic Disease in Systemic Sclerosis

Gastrointestinal involvement in patients with systemic sclerosis.

INTRODUCTION Gastrointestinal (GI) involvement is a serious complication of systemic sclerosis (SSc). OBJECTIVES The aim of the study was to determine the incidence of GI manifestations in SSc. PATIENTS AND METHODS We studied 73 patients with SSc (60 women and 13 men). Diffuse cutaneous SSc (dcSSc) was diagnosed in 30 patients and limited cutaneous SSc (lcSSc) in 43 patients. Upper GI invol...

Macrovascular disease and systemic sclerosis.

OBJECTIVE To determine if macrovascular disease is more prevalent in systemic sclerosis (SSc) compared with unaffected subjects. METHODS 54 patients with SSc (both limited and diffuse disease) and 43 unaffected control subjects of similar age and sex were recruited. All subjects underwent a basic screen for conventional atherosclerotic disease risk factors. All had non-invasive vascular asses...

Peyronie's disease in systemic sclerosis.

Intestinal dysbiosis is common in systemic sclerosis and associated with gastrointestinal and extraintestinal features of disease

BACKGROUND Recent evidence suggests a link between autoimmunity and the intestinal microbial composition in several rheumatic diseases including systemic sclerosis (SSc). The objective of this study was to investigate the prevalence of intestinal dysbiosis in SSc and to characterise patients suffering from this potentially immunomodulatory deviation. METHODS This study consisted of 98 consecu...

Cardiovascular disease in systemic sclerosis.

Cardiovascular (CV) system involvement is a frequent complication of autoimmune diseases such as systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and rheumatoid arthritis (RA). It still remains unclear if a premature atherosclerosis (ATS) occurs even in systemic sclerosis (SSc). Although microvascular disease is a hallmark of SSc, in the last few years a number of studies highlighted a higher prevalence of m...