Acute dermatomyositis-polymyositis and malignancy

A partial review of selected published case reports of AD-P associated with malignancy has been enhanced by the presentation of pertinent data on 15 unreported examples of the association. It is noteworthy that the first case in current literature of AD-P associated with a malignancy was described in 1916. The brief clinical report of a patient with proximal muscle weakness and skin lesions, with the obvious association with a malignancy (adenocarcinoma of the stomach), describes an example that has been repeated many times with different types of tumors but with essentially no variations in the clinical findings. In 1959 Williams identified 590 cases of AD with an overall tumor rate of 15%, and recently Barnes identified 258 cases of AD associated with a malignancy. The original designation, dermatomyositis or AD, has now been expanded to include proximal muscle polymyositis with systemic involvement, which syndrome at the current state of the art is indistinguishable clinically and pathologically from AD except for the lack of skin lesions. It may be that at some future time one or more immunologic features may differnetiate the clinical entity polymyositis from AD and further subdivide each of these entitites from similar clinical syndromes associated with a malignancy. However, the problem in management in either AD or polymyositis is similar. A number of patients with a malignancy and muscle weakness or neuropathy have been reported. These associations have been mentioned briefly, but insufficient data are available to determine whether these should be considered as a variant of AD-P or only casually related conditions with certain clinical features in common. Most of the patients described in the literature of AD-P with an associated malignancy have had skin lesions; a minority only have lacked this feature. However, unless a patient is followed carefully, it is possible for a transient or evanescent erythema or insignificant skin lesions to be present and not recorded in the case record.