What question did this study set out to answer?

To assess the effectiveness of musculoskeletal ultrasound in diagnosing joint lesions in patients with palindromic rheumatism compared to rheumatoid arthritis controls.

April 19, 2026Open Access

The clinical application of musculoskeletal ultrasound in diagnosing palindromic rheumatism-related joint lesions: a retrospective case-control study using rheumatoid arthritis as controls

Key Points

To assess the effectiveness of musculoskeletal ultrasound in diagnosing joint lesions in patients with palindromic rheumatism compared to rheumatoid arthritis controls.
Retrospective case-control design
32 patients with palindromic rheumatism and 32 with rheumatoid arthritis
Both groups underwent musculoskeletal ultrasound examination
Semi-quantitative scoring method used for various joint lesions
Comparison of ultrasound findings and scores between groups.
Higher hand joint involvement in the palindromic rheumatism group compared to the rheumatoid arthritis group
Higher knee joint involvement in the rheumatoid arthritis group compared to the palindromic rheumatism group
Significantly higher tenosynovitis and soft tissue inflammation detection in the palindromic rheumatism group
Lower detection rates of synovial hypertrophy, power Doppler, and bone erosion in the palindromic rheumatism group
Significantly higher tenosynovitis scores in the palindromic rheumatism group.

Abstract

To explore the clinical application of musculoskeletal ultrasound (MSUS) in the diagnosis of joint lesions in palindromic rheumatism (PR). Thirty-two PR patients (PR group) treated at the Department of Rheumatology, Ningbo No. 6 Hospital between January 2020 and September 2024 were selected as the study subjects. In parallel, 32 hospitalized RA patients (RA group) admitted between January 2024 and September 2024 were included as controls. All patients underwent MSUS examination. A semi-quantitative (SQ) grading method was used to score synovial hypertrophy (SH), power Doppler (PD), tenosynovitis, subcutaneous soft tissue inflammation, bone erosion, and GLOESS. The incidence of ultrasound findings and SQ scores were compared between the two groups. Hand joint involvement was higher in the PR group than in the RA group, whereas knee joint involvement was higher in the RA group than in the PR group, with statistically significant differences (P 0.05). GLOESS, the total ultrasound SQ score, as well as SQ scores for SH, PD, bone erosion and soft tissue inflammation were significantly lower in the PR group than in the RA group (P < 0.05). In contrast, the tenosynovitis score was significantly higher in the PR group (P < 0.05). Conclusion Arthritis in PR patients mainly involves the small joints of the hands, with characteristic MSUS features. Semi-quantitative MSUS scoring can effectively evaluate arthritis in PR patients and appears valuable as a diagnostic tool for this condition.

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Cite This Study

Ye et al. (Fri,) studied this question.

synapsesocial.com/papers/69e4734c010ef96374d8f23f https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1186/s12891-026-09791-0

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