Turkish Journal of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation 2011 , Vol 57 , Num 1

Is it Complex Regional Pain Syndrome Type 1 or Inflammatory Arthritis?

Özlem Baysal 1 ,Zühal Engünay Altan 1 ,Bekir Durmuş 2 ,Taner Baysal 1
1 İnönü Üniversitesi Tıp Fakültesi, Fiziksel Tıp ve Rehabilitasyon Anabilim Dalı, Malatya, Türkiye
2 Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Erenköy State Hospital, İstanbul, Turkey
DOI : 10.4274/tftr.57.08

Complex regional pain syndrome (CRPS) is a painful and disabling chronic progressive disease and its definition is subdivided into CRPS type I and CRPS type II. It can be seen with signs of inflammation such as pain, swelling, redness, as well as different symptoms and findings like sensory and motor dysfunctions and trophic changes. Therefore, it should be included in the differential diagnosis of painful conditions of the upper extremities. We report two cases of patients with CRPS type l with unknown etiologies who were misdiagnosed as inflammatory arthritis and also discussed in view of the literature. 

Keywords : Complex regional pain syndromes, arthritis, reflex sympathetic dystrophy, differential diagnosis