Regional migratory osteoporosis

The authors describe the features of regional migratory osteoporosis, a rare form of idiopathic algodystrophy, with special reference to the fact that 8 of the 13 patients in this series belonged to two families. The clinical, radiological and histological manifestations are discussed and the treatment described. The latter involves a combination of chemotherapy, orthopaedic measures and physiotherapy. The fact that so many different clinical manifestations of the same pathological entity occurred in the same family, and in particular the high incidence of a familial factor in the case material reported in the literature, appear to indicate the existence of a predisposition to local disturbances of bone turnover in the peri-articular bone tissue. A precipitating factor, which is often clearly evident, then causes the disease to become clinically manifest.