Whether Behçet’s patients with large vessel involvement have concurrent small vessel involvement? A case-control Study

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Behçet’s disease (BD) is a chronic multisystem disorder with the principal pathological finding of vasculitis, which may involve vessels of different sizes. The concurrence of small and large vessel involvement in BD patients is undetermined. The current study aims to evaluate small vessel involvement in BD patients with large vessel involvement. The study population comprised 35 BD patients with large vessel involvement (cases) and 35 BD patients without large vessel involvement (controls). Small vessel involvement was evaluated in all patients by capillaroscopy. Capillaroscopic findings were compared between the two groups. According to the capillaroscopic findings, all of our BD patients had small vessel involvement. The most prevalent abnormality was tortuosity (87.1%), followed by enlarged loops (58.6%) and avascular areas (51.4%). Capillaroscopy findings between the case and the control groups were not statistically different. There was a significant association between microbleeding and history of erythema nodosum (P-value = 0.015), tortuosity and a history of skin aphthosis (P-value = 0.015), architectural derangement and history of uveitis (P-Value = 0.029), the number of avascular areas and active oral aphthosis (P-value = 0.021), and architectural derangement and increased ESR (P-value = 0.011). There was no difference in nail fold folder involvement between BD patients with and without large vessel involvement; however, some capillaroscopic features were associated with some disease manifestations.