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Unpopular opinion: spinach can be bad for you

PMR might be one of the most rewarding diagnoses to make in real practice: the patient comes to you in severe debilitating pain, and you prescribe steroids, giving them their lives back! As much as this impressive response makes your intervention appear almost magical, there is the often-forgotten story about the implications of such a diagnosis and treatment on patients' daily lives. 

Focus on the Fasting Lipid Profile

How best do we communicate CV risk associated with RA to other members of the treating team, most particularly the primary care physicians? After some experimentation, I have come up with an approach that seems to work and which does not take up much time.

Why aren’t we preventing RA yet?

Ever since the seminal studies demonstrating a prolonged preclinical period for seropositive RA, which have been replicated in multiple cohorts around the world using both retrospective and prospective study designs, the rheumatology community has been tantalized by the prospect of preventing the onset of inflammatory joint disease in seropositive individuals exhibiting no clinically detectable synovitis. So why can’t we prevent RA yet?

A Brief History of Rheumatoid Arthritis Mimics

Imagine that 100 years from now, your great granddaughter, an eminent rheumatologist, reviews the history of rheumatoid arthritis mimics.

Best of 2022: Five Mistakes When Diagnosing Still’s Disease

Adult-onset Still's presents an interesting and diagnostic challenge when encountered. Here are 5 tips to improve your diagnostic acumen for this febrile disorder.

The Still’s Continua

The concept of a “Still’s disease continuum” that encompasses both sJIA and AOSD is based on the many common clinical, genetic and laboratory features shared by both sJIA and AOSD.

AOSD: complicated disease or a disease with complications?

Many clinicians may not have seen a case of AOSD during training, which overall leads to several delays in referrals and appropriate diagnosis for AOSD patients. AOSD is an autoinflammatory disease where innate immunity plays a primary role and is characterized by seemingly unprovoked inflammation, but without the high-titer autoantibodies or antigen specific T cells seen in autoimmune diseases.

Five Mistakes When Diagnosing Still’s Disease

Adult-onset Still's presents an interesting and diagnostic challenge when encountered. Here are 5 tips to improve your diagnostic acumen for this febrile disorder.

Best of 2017: Across the Table: Cush & Erkan on Antiphospholipid Syndrome

The antiphospholipid syndrome (APS) is a common disorder affecting patients with and without autoimmune disease. Despite wider recognition of APS among physicians as well as the expanding research collaborations, many clinical questions are still encountered in clinical practice, which require further evidence-based studies. In this “Across the Table” edition, Drs. Cush and Erkan discuss some of these APS-related questions. Our guest expert, Dr. Doruk Erkan offers up his approach to diagnosis and management of APS.

Across the Table: Cush & Erkan on Antiphospholipid Syndrome (Best of 2017)

The antiphospholipid syndrome (APS) is a common disorder affecting patients with and without autoimmune disease. Despite wider recognition of APS among physicians as well as the expanding research collaborations, many clinical questions are still encountered in clinical practice, which require further evidence-based studies. In this “Across the Table” edition, Drs. Cush and Erkan discuss some of these APS-related questions. Our guest expert, Dr. Doruk Erkan offers up his approach to diagnosis and management of APS.

Across the Table: Cush & Erkan on Antiphospholipid Syndrome

The antiphospholipid syndrome (APS) is a common disorder affecting patients with and without autoimmune disease. Despite wider recognition of APS among physicians as well as the expanding research collaborations, many clinical questions are still encountered in clinical practice, which require further evidence-based studies. In this “Across the Table” edition, Drs. Cush and Erkan discuss some of these APS-related questions. Our guest expert, Dr. Doruk Erkan offers up his approach to diagnosis and management of APS.

The Brooklyn HAQ

The Health Assessment Questionnaire is a utilitarian outcome measure, often used in clinical trials and daily practice. Unless you’re still prescribing penacillamine, never attended an ACR meeting, and never read an RA clinical trial, you’re quite familiar with the HAQ and its use in practice. So, surely you’ve heard of the “Brooklyn HAQ”?