Journal of Clinical Case Reports

Patients with Behcet’s Disease and Cardiovascular Risk Factors are at Risk for Early Cardiovascular and Renal Disease

Abstract

Elon HCVD, Houwen TBVD, Kappen JH, Daele PV, Caliskan K, Hagen MMV and Laar JAMV

We present a case of a 39-year-old Turkish female patient with a mild clinical phenotype of Behçet’s disease (BD), but experiencing severe cardiac and renal disease, probably enhanced by microvascular atherosclerosis and hypertension. In this case, several cardiovascular risk factors like positive family history, hypertension and smoking were present. Up until recently cardiovascular risk factors were relatively neglected in BD, however recent reports suggest that traditional risk factors are an independent predictor of early coronary artery disease-related morbidity in young BD patients. With this case report we want to stress the fact that severe atherosclerotic complications occur even in young BD patients with longstanding stable, mild disease. This is probably due to chronic inflammation process in chronic diseases like BD, which is a known factor in the initiation and progression of the atherosclerotic process. Therefore, a tight, careful risk factor management should be implied during the follow-up of BD patients.