Giuseppe Murdaca, Simone Caprioli, Alessandro Tonacci, Lucia Billeci, Monica Greco, Simone Negrini, Giuseppe Cittadini, Patrizia Zentilin, Elvira Ventura Spagnolo, Sebastiano Gangemi
INTRODUCTION: Systemic sclerosis (SSc) is a systemic immune-mediated disease, featuring fibrosis of the skin and organs, and has the greatest mortality among rheumatic diseases. The nervous system involvement has recently been demonstrated, although actual lung involvement is considered the leading cause of death in SSc and, therefore, should be diagnosed early. Pulmonary function tests are not sensitive enough to be used for screening purposes, thus they should be flanked by other clinical examinations; however, this would lead to a risk of overtesting, with considerable costs for the health system and an unnecessary burden for the patients...
October 12, 2021: Diagnostics