Tuberculous arthritis of the finger: a forgotten disease

We present a case of a 64-year-old man from Belgian origin with a chronic painful swelling of the third finger. A chronic arthritis from atypical germ was suspected at the third metacarpo-phalangeal joint on the plain radiography, ultrasonography and MR examination. A few months later, he developed thoracic back pain. Plain radiographs, a Technetium-99m bone scan and MR examination of the thoracic spine revealed a spondylodiscitis of the dorsal spine. A tuberculous origin was found on the biopsy of the affected dorsal vertebral bodies D9 and D10 as suspected on the first imaging examinations of the finger. Besides the patient was found to be HIV-positive. This case shows that it is important to think of musculoskeletal tuberculosis particularly in high-risk persons because if left untreated, it can be devastating.