Chronic Ulcerative Pharyngitis: Radiographic Studies of Progressive Dysphagia in Five Patients

CHRONIC ulcerative pharyngitis is a condition found in association with the necrotizing type of aphthous stomatitis designated as periadenitis by Sutton.1This condition may be accompanied by chronic inflammatory processes in other organs, including the eyes, joints, urethra and genitalia, rectum and anus, and the central nervous system (CNS).2This spectrum of involvement is often designated as Behcet's syndrome.3Cutaneous ulcerations, erythema nodosum and thrombophlebitis are also described. These variably disseminated inflammatory lesions are of unknown etiology. They are generally suppressed in part by adrenocorticosteroid medications.4Comparable syndromes of chronic inflammation of mouth, eyes, skin, urethra and joints are found in Reiter's disease and in the Stevens-Johnson form of erythema multiforme. From the subjects of a continuing study of aphthous stomatitis at the Clinical Center, National Institutes of Health (NIH),5,6five patients with severe pharyngeal involvement were selected to illustrate their unusual forms of pharyngeal