Prof Şinasi Özsoylu, MD, Department of Pediatrics, Hematology Unit, Faculty of Medicine, Hacettepe University, Ankara 06100 (Turkey) I have read with interest the article by Mazzucconi et al. [1] entitled ‘Danazol Therapy in Refractory Chronic Immune Thrombocytopenic Purpura’ in the recent issue of the journal. I would like to bring to the authors’ attention that marked improvement of platelet ...

We report 3 cases of bilateral orbital sclerosing inflammation and review the literatures concerning bilateral idiopathic orbital inflammation. We found that when idiopathic orbital inflammation presents as a bilaterally diffuse retrobulbar apical mass, the sclerosing subtype must be considered first, and an orbital biopsy should be performed. The present cases were characterized by chronic-ons...

1 Minden K, Niewerth M, Listing J et al. Long-term outcome in patients with juvenile idiopathic arthritis. Arthritis Rheum 2002;46:2392–401. 2 Hashkes PJ, Laxer RM. Medical treatment of juvenile idiopathic arthritis. J Am Med Assoc 2005;294:1671–84. 3 Cortis E, Insalaco A. Macrophage activation syndrome in juvenile idiopathic arthritis. Acta Paediatr 2006;95(Suppl.):38–41. 4 Cohen SB, Emery P, ...

Background Treatment of Chronic Idiopathic Urticaria (CIU) may be challenging, as patients can be refractory to various treatments. This may be due to an autoimmune mechanism in its pathogenesis. CIU has been shown to be associated with autoantibodies to IgE or IgE receptor and with thyroid autoimmunity [1,2]. Treatments targeting this autoimmune pathogenesis are now being used, such as intrave...

background: idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura is an autoimmune blood disorder in which platelet destruction is mediated by anti-platelet antibodies. there are two forms of itp: acute and chronic. the aim of the present study was to evaluate the clinical variables in adult patients with acute itp in west of iran. patients and methods: medical records of adult patients with diagnosis of acute i...

Chronic idiopathic axonal polyneuropathy is a frequent diagnosis in patients suffering from idiopathic polyneuropathy and neuropathic pain. No guidelines exist on how to treat these patients. To date, there are no results available from randomized clinical trials, and mostly classical neuropathic analgesics are prescribed, such as amitriptyline and gabapentine. However, the usefulness of these ...

Ileal pouch-anal anastomosis (IPAA) is the standard restorative procedure after proctocolectomy in patients with ulcerative colitis (UC) who require colectomy. The ileal pouch is susceptible to a variety of insults including mechanical injury, ischemia, fecal stasis, and infectious agents. In addition, the development of recurrent and idiopathic inflammatory bowel disease and neoplasia may occu...

About 25 to 30% of patients with idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP) are resistant to standard treatment with steroids and splenectomy. In these patients with chronic refractory ITP, there is no proven algorithm for standard care. Recently, the chimeric anti-CD20 monoclonal antibody rituximab was considered as an alternative treatment option in this patient group. We present a patient wit...