Wrist arthrography: review and comparison of normals, rheumatoid arthritis and gout patients

Bilateral wrist arthrograms performed on a randomly selected population of 100 adult males revealed an unexpected high prevalence of communications among the three wrist compartments. These findings warrant reassessment of wrist arthrographic criteris for synovial involvement of rheumatoid arthritis. Midcarpal joint extension correlated with increasing age and occupational trauma, suggesting a degenerative or "wear and tear" mechanism in the breakdown of the delicate interosseous intercarpal ligaments. Such extension was also found to a greater than expected frequency in gout. Radioulnar joint extension correlated with acute trauma secondary to wrist sprains or fractures, presumably through tears in the tough triangular fibrocartilage. Such extension was also found to a greater than expected frequency in RA. While midcarpal extension and inferior radioulnar extension correlate with gout and RA, respectively, their occurrence in a random adult male population is so frequent (as is three compartment communication) as to obviate their diagnostic value. However, synovial corrugation and lymphatic visualization were seen only in the wrists of patients with diagnosed inflammatory arthritic conditions and may have potential diagnostic significance. Selected anthropometric variables were analyzed by age in this randomly selected adult male population and compared with the gouty and RA patient groups. Significant continuously decreasing grip strength and hand mineralization occurred with age, which was opposite to the trend for osteoarthrosis. The hematocrit, erythrocyte sedimentation rate, and serum uric acid were impressively stable until the ninth or older decades, at which time a significant increase in sedimentation rate and decrease in hematocrit were found.