Behçet's Disease in Children: Diagnostic and Management Challenges

Abstract

Behçet's Disease (BD) is an inflammatory disease of unknown etiology with multisystemic involvement, being the main clinical manifestations represented by recurrent oral and genital ulcerations and uveitis. The disease has typically a chronic-relapsing course and may cause significant morbidity and mortality due to eye, vascular and neurological involvement. Although BD is more frequently diagnosed in adulthood, the disease onset can also be in pediatric age. Pediatric-onset BD is commonly featured by an incomplete clinical picture, and therefore the diagnosis represents a considerable clinical challenge for the physicians. The first classification criteria for pediatric BD, based on a scoring system, have been proposed few years ago. This work focuses on the main difficulties concerning both the diagnostic approach and the treatment of BD in pediatric age. The recommendation for the treatment of pediatric BD has been recently updated and allowed a considerable improvement of the therapeutic strategies. In particular, the use of anti-TNFα drugs as a second-line option for refractory BD, and as a first-line treatment in severe ocular and neurological involvement, has demonstrated to be effective in improving the outcome of BD patients. The knowledge about the molecular pathogenesis is progressively increasing, showing that BD shares common features with autoimmune and autoinflammatory disorders, and thus leading to the use of new biologic agents targeting the main mediators involved in the determination of BD. Anti-IL-17, anti-IL-23, anti-IL-1 and anti-IL-6 agents have shown promising results for the treatment of refractory BD in clinical trials and will represent an important alternative for the therapeutic approach to the disease.

Keywords: Behçet’s disease; aphtosis; autoimmunity; autoinflammatory diseases; biologic drugs; differential diagnosis.