Connective Tissue Disease (cont.)

The autoimmune connective tissue diseases include systemic lupus erythematosus, rheumatoid arthritis, scleroderma, polymyositis, and dermatomyositis. These are considered classic connective tissue diseases. Each of these diseases has a "classic" presentation with typical findings that doctors can recognize during an examination. Each also has various typical blood test abnormalities and a variety of abnormal antibodies that are commonly found in blood. However, each of these diseases can evolve slowly or rapidly from very subtle abnormalities before demonstrating the classic features that help in the diagnosis.

Sometimes, in the early stages, doctors simply refer to the "undifferentiated" condition as a collagen vascular disease or undifferentiated connective tissue disease (UCTD) until more defined symptoms appear. The change into a more definable disease may occur over years or never happen. Furthermore, the undifferentiated features may, themselves, disappear at which point there is no disease at all.

When more than one autoimmune connective tissue disease is present in the same person their condition is often referred to as an “overlap” syndrome of connective tissue disease. One particular overlap syndrome is characterized by features of scleroderma, lupus, and polymyositis and is referred to as mixed connective tissue disease (MCTD), also known as Sharp's syndrome.

REFERENCE:

Klippel, John H., et al., eds. Primer on Rheumatic Diseases. 13th ed. New York: Springer, 2008.

Source: MedicineNet.com
http://www.medicinenet.com/connective_tissue_disease/article.htm