Hello and welcome to the Zero to Finals podcast. My name is Tom and in this episode I'm going to be

talking to you about Soriotic arthritis. And if you want to follow along with written notes on this

topic, as always you can follow along at zero definals.com slash sorriatic arthritis or in the rheumatology section of the zero definals medicine book.

So let's get straight into it.

Soriatic arthritis is an inflammatory arthritis that's associated with psoriasis and it can vary

in severity.

So patients might have a mild, stiffening and soreness in the joint, or the joint can

be completely destroyed in a condition called arthritis mutilands. It occurs in about 10 to 20%

of patients who have psoriasis, the skin condition which causes rashies and scaly patches to occur

on places like the elbows or on the scalp.

And usually it occurs within about 10 years of developing the skin changes.

So if you've had the skin changes for more than 10 years and they haven't developed

psoriotic arthritis, then it's unlikely to develop after 10 years.

It typically affects people in middle age, but it can occur at any age. It's part of the group of conditions called seronegative

spondoloarthropathies. And these are seronegative inflammatory arthritis like reactive arthritis,

ankylosing spondylitis, and entropathic arthritis.

There's a few patterns of the condition, and it doesn't really affect a single pattern of joints in the same way that you find osteoarthritis or rheumatoid arthritis affects specific joints.

There's several recognized patterns of

psoriotic arthritis. One of those patterns is a symmetrical polyarthritis that presents similarly to

rheumatoid and is more common in women and this affects the hands, the wrists, the ankles,

and the distal interphalangeal joints of the fingers. The MCP joints or the knuckles are less

commonly affected unlike in rheumatoid arthritis. Another classic pattern of psoriotic arthritis is an

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