Rheumatology Advance Access originally published online on November 1, 2005
Rheumatology 2006 45(3):348-352; doi:10.1093/rheumatology/kei165
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A double-blind trial of depot corticosteroids in Behçet's syndrome


Department of Dermatology, 1 Division of Rheumatology, Department of Medicine, 2 Department of Ophthalmology and 3 Department of Biostatistics, Behçet's Syndrome Research Centre, Cerrahpasa Medical Faculty, University of Istanbul, Turkey.
Correspondence to: S. Yurdakul, Atakoy 9. Kisim D 12 B Kapisi Daire 12, 34750 Istanbul, Turkey. E-mail: profsyurdakul{at}hotmail.com
Objectives. Corticosteroids are widely used in Behçet's syndrome despite the absence of controlled studies. We assessed the effect of depot corticosteroids primarily for genital ulcers and secondarily for the other mucocutaneous manifestations of Behçet's syndrome.
Methods. We randomized 86 patients who had active disease with genital ulcers to receive either intramuscular corticosteroid injections (40 mg methylprednisolone acetate) or placebo every 3 weeks for 27 weeks.
Results. Seventy-six patients (88%) completed the treatment. There were no significant differences in the mean number of genital and oral ulcers, or folliculitis between groups. The mean number of erythema nodosum lesions was less in the corticosteroid group as a whole (P=0.0046); subgroup analyses revealed that this was significant for females (P=0.0148) but not for males (P=0.1).
Conclusion. Low-dose depot corticosteroids did not have any beneficial effect on genital ulcers. However, it was useful in controlling erythema nodosum lesions, especially among the females.
KEY WORDS: Behçet, Corticosteroids, Erythema nodosum, Genital ulcer, Therapy
These authors contributed equally to this work.
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