MORPHOLOGICAL AND FUNCTIONAL ALTERATIONS OF NAILFOLD CAPILLARIES IN APATIENT WITH DERMATOMYOSITIS

We report on a 70-year-old female patient with dermatomyositis. The co nnective tissue vascular bed was studied with capillaroscopy to evalua te morphological and functional changes of skin capillaries. Capillaro scopic findings showed morphological alterations such as rarefication of capillaries, avascular fields and tortuosity of nailfold capillarie s. In addition, fluorescence-videomicroscopy showed pathologically inc reased transcapillary diffusion of dye in the apex region of nutritive skin capillaries. Increased capillary leakage probably contributed to the developement of oedema in our patient. Immunosupressive therapy c ombined with intensified manual lymphatic drainage was successful.