Systemic sclerosis, or scleroderma, is a complex medical disorder characterized by limited or diffuse skin thickening with frequent involvement of internal organs such as lungs, gastrointestinal tract, or kidneys. Docetaxel is a chemotherapeutic agent which has been associated with cutaneous side effects. An uncommon cutaneous side effect of docetaxel is scleroderma-like skin changes that exten...

labmedicine.com November 2005 Volume 36 Number 11 LABMEDICINE 723 Systemic sclerosis is a chronic disease of unknown etiology characterized by abnormal accumulation of fibrous tissue in the skin and multiple organs.1 Scleroderma derives its name from the Greek words “sclerosis” (hardness) and “derma” (skin), thus aptly named “hard skin,” a feature that is common to all the different types of sc...

Scleroderma is a rare connective tissue disease that is manifested by cutaneous sclerosis and variable systemic involvement. Two categories of scleroderma are known: systemic sclerosis, characterized by cutaneous sclerosis and visceral involvement, and localized scleroderma or morphea which classically presents benign and self-limited evolution and is confined to the skin and/or underlying tiss...

Hospital Physician January 2008 33 S ystemic sclerosis, or scleroderma, is a rare connective tissue disease of unknown etiology. The word scleroderma, derived from the Greek words scleros for hard and derma for skin, refers to the hallmark finding of chronic hardening and thickening of the skin that occurs in this disease. The clinical manifestations of systemic sclerosis range from localized s...

The ocular manifestations of progressive systemic sclerosis (PSS) have been described by Manschot (i 965), Nelken and Michaelson (196 I), Pollack and Becker (1962), and Stucchi and Geiser (I967). These reports were mainly limited to isolated cases, although Stucchi and Geiser (i967) studied a series of fourteen patients-thirteen with generalized scleroderma and one in whom the scleroderma was c...

Primary cardiac involvement in systemic sclerosis is common, often subclinical, and is associated with significant mortality. We report the case of a patient who developed autoimmune myocarditis at an early stage of systemic sclerosis, who completely recovered from cardiac dysfunction under optimal medical therapy for heart failure and immunosuppression. This challenging case aims at increasing...

Systemic and localized scleroderma are difficult to manage diseases with no accepted gold standard of therapy to date. Phototherapeutic modalities for scleroderma show promise. A PubMed search of information on phototherapy for scleroderma was conducted. The information was classified into effects on pathogenesis and clinical outcomes. Studies on photopheresis were excluded. There were no rando...

A 51-year-old female developed linear-like scleroderma in the left thigh following a linear wound caused by a car accident. 27 years later she also developed a typical diffuse cutaneous systemic sclerosis with extensive skin involvement and bibasilar pulmonary fibrosis. The second case is a 39-year-old female who had a history of Raynaud's phenomenon since early childhood. She developed a morph...