[Ulceromutilating acroosteopathy of the feet (author's transl)]

The cutaneo-osseous syndrome of ulceromutilating acroosteopathy, occurring in a rare hereditary and a "symptomatic" form, represents a nosologically clearly defined disease of the forefoot. Main symptoms are painless, deeply penetrating plantar ulcers with hyperkeratotic edges, non-segmental peripheral sensory neuropathy with a more or less dissociated disturbance of sensitivity and pyrexia of the forefoot (or single toes) without typical clinical signs of inflammation. Secondary symptoms, obligatory in therapy-resistant cases, include (almost) non-reactive acroosteolyses of the "neuropathic" type. The disease, increasing potentially in frequency and not recognised sufficiently, can only be treated successfully when pathogenic risk and precipitation factors are abolished selectively. Twenty-five cases could be observed over a period of 11 years with an increasing incidence.