Unnecessary diagnostic investigations in benign acute childhood myositis: a case series report.

C Neocleous, C Spanou, E Mpampalis, S Xatzigeorgiou, C Pavlidou, E Poulos, F Tzanetis

Department of Paediatrics, General Hospital of Drama, Drama, Greece. xneoc@yahoo.gr

Scottish medical journal 2012 Aug

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Benign acute childhood myositis (BACM) is a rare, acute, self-limiting muscle disorder, mainly affecting school-aged boys, with an excellent prognosis, requiring no therapeutic intervention. We report a series of seven previously healthy school-aged children with clinical and laboratory findings suggesting BACM where no specific diagnostic investigations were performed. All of the children were hospitalized without any specific therapeutic intervention and were discharged after two or three days free of symptoms, residual impairment or other complication. This report emphasizes that the correct diagnosis of BACM, by considering the characteristic clinical and laboratory findings of this syndrome and by recognizing more severe pathological conditions, which must be excluded from the diagnosis, can prevent unnecessary diagnostic investigations and reassure both parents and patients of the excellent prognosis.

Citation

C Neocleous, C Spanou, E Mpampalis, S Xatzigeorgiou, C Pavlidou, E Poulos, F Tzanetis. Unnecessary diagnostic investigations in benign acute childhood myositis: a case series report. Scottish medical journal. 2012 Aug;57(3):182