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5TH NATIONAL CONFERENCE OF PEDIATRIC RHEUMATOLOGY, KOLKATA, 29TH & 30TH SEPTEMBER 2007
Mausumi Nandy
Associate Professor, Pediatric Medicine, NRS Medical College, Kolkata
JIA is the commonest rheumatological problem seen in children. It is always a diagnostic challenge for the clinician. As there is no specific diagnostic test and it is a diagnosis by exclusion, various attempts have been made to classify this condition at different times by different groups. First was ACR criteria in 1970 who proposed the term juvenile rheumatoid arthritis which was followed in 1977 by EULAR classification with the term juvenile chronic arthtritis. The most recent is the classification proposed by the Task force of Pediatric standing Committee of ILAR in 1995 at Santiago, Chile which was later revised in Durban in 1997 under the umbrella term juvenile idiopathic arthritis(JIA). JIA includes 7 subtypes, viz. Polyarticular RA positive & RA negative, Oligoarthritis, Systemic Onset, Juvenile Psoriatic arthritis, Enthesitis related arthritis and others.
Although no classification system meets all the requirements for chronic childhood arthropathies, yet studies have revealed that the ILAR classification is most practical. Therfore,this classification system is expected to change with better understanding of the disease in future.
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