Case Report
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2016. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastrointest Pharmacol Ther. Nov 6, 2016; 7(4): 579-583
Published online Nov 6, 2016. doi: 10.4292/wjgpt.v7.i4.579
Osteonecrosis of both knees in a woman with Crohn's disease
Mara Barbosa, José Cotter
Mara Barbosa, José Cotter, Department of Gastroenterology, Hospital da Senhora da Oliveira, Rua dos Cutileiros, Creixomil, 4835-044 Guimarães, Portugal
Author contributions: The authors made equal contributions to the study; Barbosa M drafted the manuscript; Cotter J critically reviewed the manuscript.
Institutional review board statement: This study was reviewed and approved by Hospital da Senhora da Oliveira Institutional Review Board.
Informed consent statement: Written informed consent was obtained from the patient described in this case report.
Conflict-of-interest statement: Mara Barbosa and José Cotter certify that they have no conflit-of-interest.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Mara Barbosa, MD, Department of Gastroenterology, Hospital da Senhora da Oliveira, Creixomil, 4835-044 Guimarães, Portugal. maraisabelbarbosa@net.sapo.pt
Telephone: +351-933-112632 Fax: +351-253-513592
Received: April 11, 2016
Peer-review started: April 13, 2016
First decision: July 20, 2016
Revised: August 7, 2016
Accepted: September 13, 2016
Article in press: September 15, 2016
Published online: November 6, 2016
Core Tip

Core tip: Although very rare, osteonecrosis is a devasting event that can occur in Crohn’s disease (CD). We present the case of a 22 years old woman with CD who was diagnosed with osteonecrosis of both knees. As we demonstrate with this report, awareness of risk factors, such as corticosteroid therapy and inflammatory bowel disease activity, is crucial to establish the diagnosis of this inflammatory bowel disease rheumatological complication. Prompt treatment is recommended. A review of the literature is also presented.