Background A 31-year-old woman presented with a 5-year history of painful ulcerations, palpable purpura, porcelain-white atrophic scars of the malleolar region and dorsal aspect of the feet, livedo reticularis on the limbs, arthralgia, xerophthalmia, and xerostomia. Methods Skin biopsy revealed vessel wall hyalinization and thrombosis of the microvasculature with a very scarce dermal inflammatory infiltrate. Biopsy of the oral mucosa showed mononuclear infiltration of an intralobular duct of a salivary gland.Results Laboratory studies, including autoantibodies and inflammation markers, were normal, except for a positive rheumatoid factor. Coagulation screening revealed C677T methylenetetrahydrofolate reductase (MTHFR) mutation, with a normal serum homocysteine.The patient was treated with oral methylprednisolone (32 mg/day with progressive reduction) and enoxaparin (20 mg/day subcutaneously), with complete ulcer healing within 4 months. ConclusionLivedoid vasculitis or vasculopathy has not been referred to previously in association with Sjögren's syndrome, but may be associated with other autoimmune disorders and anomalies of coagulation, namely factor V Leiden mutation, protein C deficiency, and MTHFR mutation, associated or not with hyperhomocysteinemia, a condition that seems to confer an increased risk of recurrent arterial and venous thrombosis. We stress the importance of anticoagulant therapy for ulcer healing and for the prevention of other thrombotic events.

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Rev Bras Med Fam Comunidade. Rio de Janeiro 1-10 1Quaternary prevention: a gaze on medicalization in the practice of family doctorsPrevenção quaternária: um olhar sobre a medicalização na prática dos médicos de família AbstractThe medicalization is a complex and widespread social phenomenon which involves different agents and institutions, such as the pharmaceutical and medical industry, governments, health systems, health professionals, and citizens. In this regard, doctors and health professionals play an important role in reproducing and struggling with medicalization, by recognizing that medicine and health care can generate as much harm as benefits. Family doctors have to deal with overmedicalization and its associated phenomena (i.e. overdiagnosis, overtreatment, disease mongering) on a daily basis as they act as gatekeepers of health systems. As the first point of contact, family physicians and their health teams get the demands and social needs brought by individuals and communities under their care, which usually are influenced by the health marketing and an interventionist medical perspective. This article discusses some key concepts of medicalization and its determinants, especially the contributions of biomedical science and its epistemological basis to the phenomenon. It also briefly develops some thoughts on the medicalization, in the Brazilian context. Finally, it analyses the quaternary prevention approach to medicalization which proposes changes in its object and attitude to medical practice in order to avoid unnecessary interventions, thus, protecting patients from the excesses of medicine. ResumoA medicalização é um fenômeno social complexo e disseminado no qual estão envolvidos diferentes agentes e instituições, tais como a indústria médica/farmacêutica, governos, profissionais/sistemas de saúde e cidadãos. Por sua vez, médicos e profissionais de saúde desempenham importante papel na reprodução e no enfrentamento da medicalização, haja visto que a medicina e os cuidados em saúde podem gerar tanto danos como benefícios. Médicos de família lidam diariamente com a sobremedicalização e seus fenômenos associados (i.e. sobrediagnóstico, sobretratamento, comercialização de doenças) por desempenharem função-filtro nos sistemas de saúde. Por ser o primeiro ponto de contato, esses profissionais e suas equipes acolhem as demandas e necessidades sociais trazidas pelas pessoas e comunidades sob seus cuidados, que comumente estão influenciadas por uma perspectiva médica intervencionista e pelo marketing da saúde. Este artigo discute alguns conceitos principais da medicalização e seus determinantes, em especial as contribuições da ciência biomédica e suas bases epistemológicas para o fenômeno. Ele também desenvolve, sucintamente, algumas reflexões sobre a medicalização na prática do médico de família e comunidade, no contexto brasileiro. Por fim, analisa o enfoque da prevenção quaternária acerca da medicalização, que propõe mudanças de objeto e de atitude na prática médica, evitando, assim, intervenções de...

Nós, médicos de família e comunidade reunidos no I Seminário Brasileiro de Prevenção Quaternária, trazemos o seguinte manifesto em prol de uma Medicina isenta de conflitos de interesses e imbuída de profissionalismo no seu sentido mais pleno. Estamos baseados nos seguintes pressupostos: Parecer CEP: não se aplica. Código de Ética Médica Conflito de interesses:declaram não haver.

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Objective: this part I article explores the different meanings of relevant keywords for General Practice/Family Medicine (GP/FM) in the prevention domain. The aim is to contribute to information process in GP/FM by keeping in line with the main terms used in health care organization. Methods: important keywords for GP/FM in the prevention domain were selected. Then, a search was carried out on the main sources in GP/FM databases, as well as in Medical Subject Heading and major terminological databases available online. Results and Discussion: there is discrepancy between the conceptual contents of major prevention models amongst the usual bibliographic sources of knowledge in GP/FM in particular and medicine in general. Conclusion: For GP/FM, distribution of preventive activities is now firmly established on a new constructivist model, privileging the doctor-patient relationships and introducing a cybernetic thinking on the health care activities with a special commitment to ethics and the positive duty of beneficence.

The words of prevention, part II: ten terms in the realm of quaternary preventionAs palavras da prevenção, parte II: dez termos no âmbito da prevenção quaternária AbstractObjective: this part II article about the 'words of prevention' presents in a terminological way the content of ten current concepts used in the prevention domain which are closely linked to quaternary prevention: (1) overinformation; (2) overdiagnosis; (3) medically unexplained symptoms; (4) overmedicalization; (5) incidentaloma; (6) overscreening; (7) overtreatment; (8) shared decision making; (9) deprescribing; and (10) disease mongering. Methods: with the support of the laboratory team of the University of Rouen, France, which is dedicated to medical terminology and semantic relationships, it was possible to utilize a graphic user interface (called DBGUI) allowing the construction of links for each of chosen terms, and making automatic links to MeSH, if any. Those concepts are analyzed in their environment in current literature, as well as in their MeSH counterparts, if any, and related semantic online terminologies. Results and Discussion: the rules in terminological development aspire to cover the whole field of a concept and in the meantime, they can help to avoid the noise due to proxy and not exactly related issues. This refers to exhaustivity and specificity in information retrieval. Our finds show that referring to MeSH only in information retrieval in General Practice/Family medicine can induce much noise and poor adequacy to the subject investigated. Conclusion: gathering concepts in specially prepared terminologies for further development of ontologies is a necessity to enter in the semantic web area and the era of disseminated data in family medicine. ResumoObjetivo: este artigo parte II sobre as 'palavras da prevenção' apresenta de uma forma terminológica o conteúdo de dez conceitos atuais utilizados no domínio da prevenção, que estão intimamente ligados à prevenção quaternária: (1) sobrecarga de informação; (2) sobrediagnóstico; (3) sintomas sem explicação médica; (4) sobremedicalização; (5) incidentaloma; (6) sobrerrastreamento; (7) sobretratamento; (8) tomada de decisão compartilhada; (9) desprescrição; e (10) comercialização de doenças. Métodos: com o apoio da equipe do laboratório da Universidade de Rouen, França, que se dedica à terminologia médica e às relações semânticas, foi possível utilizar uma interface gráfica de usuário (chamado DBGUI) permitindo a construção de links para cada um dos termos escolhidos, fazendo ligações automáticas para o MeSH, caso houvesse. Estes conceitos foram analisados no seu ambiente na literatura corrente, bem como os seus homólogos no MeSH, caso houvesse, e terminologias semânticas online a eles relacionadas. Resultados e Discussão: as regras em desenvolvimento terminológico aspiram cobrir todo o campo de um conceito, ao mesmo tempo em que podem auxiliar a evitar ruídos devido a aproximações e questões não exatamente relacionadas. Isto se refere à exaustividade e especificidade na recuper...

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