Digital Arteritis in Rheumatoid Disease

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Abstract
Brachial arteriography has been used to investigate the digital circulation in 11 patients with rheumatoid arthritis, in all of whom (except one in whom arteriography was performed at autopsy) there was some reason to suspect the presence of digital arterial disease. In all there was a varying degree of vascular occlusion or distortion, and histological examination has shown a non-specific arterial lesion with intimal thickening. Visceral arteritis was sometimes present with lesions indistinguishable from either acute or healed polyarteritis nodosa. In two patients with early rheumatoid arthritis, and no signs of peripheral vascular disease, arteriography was normal.