WEDNESDAY, March 29 (HealthDay News) -- Low-dose depot corticosteroids do not significantly reduce genital ulcers, oral ulcerations, folliculitis or arthritis in patients with Behcet's syndrome (BS), according to the first double-blind, placebo-controlled study of the treatment in BS, which was published in the March issue of Rheumatology.
Cem Mat, M.D., of the University of Istanbul, Turkey, and colleagues gave 86 patients who had active disease with genital ulcers either 40 milligrams of injected methylprednisolone acetate or placebo every three weeks for 27 weeks. Corticosteroids are commonly used in BS patients in spite of the fact that there are no controlled studies to support the practice, according to the authors.
In the 76 patients who finished the treatment, the researchers did not find a significant difference in numbers of oral ulcers, genital ulcers, or folliculitis between the treatment and placebo groups. Corticosteroids did significantly diminish erythema nodosum lesions in women with BS but did not show the same effect in men.
"Reports of therapeutic trials with negative results are rare and it is, therefore, unusual that this study has been reported by Mat et al.," Colin G. Barnes, M.D., of Royal London Hospital in London, England, wrote in an accompanying editorial. "However, the result of this trial is important, as it demonstrates that corticosteroids are not indicated for these common manifestations of BS, mucocutaneous and arthritic, at least in the doses used in this trial, despite the underlying vasculitic pathology of the condition."
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