Ancient Arthritis: RheumMadness 2022 Dinosaur SpA Scouting Report

In the animal kingdom, flexibility can come at a cost. More flexible joints and spines are more maneuverable. But more flexibility also opens the door to more injury (think Ehlers-Danlos syndrome and the like). Thus, it’s possible spondyloarthropathy may have provided musculoskeletal protection to various species. More research may be helpful in this regard.

Another line of thought considers disease etiologies. Human-centric environmental risk factors, such as smoking, oral health and contrived diets, have been implicated in the pathogenesis of rheumatoid arthritis, which is a much more recent disease that—as far as we know—only affects humans and their ancestral relatives. We can perhaps postulate that some well-established risk factors for spondyloarthropathy, such as sheer mechanical stress and reactive arthritis from sexually transmitted organisms, were so ubiquitous that no species was spared from spondyloarthropathy. One can only imagine how much reproduction was required in times of the unforgiving Jurassic world—and sadly no penicillin was lying around.

Chances in the Tournament

A perusal of Google’s finest artistic renditions of Chalicotheriidae may initially spur rapturous visions of defensive greatness sure to carry this team to win the tournament. It’s an interesting observation that spondyloarthropathy is an ancient form of arthritis shared across various orders and apparently classes of the animal kingdom. However, the vulnerability of the results to confounding and probable reduced direct application to human patients compared with other teams make it doubtful Dinosaur Spondyloarthritis will advance beyond the Final Four. This team could be a dark horse, though one that is hopefully not inflicted by inflammatory back pain.

Evan Dombrosky, MD, is a first-year rheumatology fellow in the Virginia Commonwealth University Rheumatology Fellowship Program, Richmond, Va.

Nima Madanchi, MD, is a second-year rheumatology fellow in the Virginia Commonwealth University Rheumatology Fellowship Program, Richmond, Va.

Abhishek Nandan, MD, is the associate program director of the Virginia Commonwealth University Rheumatology Fellowship Program, Richmond, Va.

Huzaefah Syed, MD, is the program director of the Virginia Commonwealth University Rheumatology Fellowship Program, Richmond, Va.

References

1. Rothschild BM, Prothero DR, Rothschild C. Origins of spondyloarthropathy in perissodactyla. Clin Exp Rheumatol. Nov–Dec 2001;19(6):628–632.
2. Rothschild BM. Spondyloarthropathy in the Jurassic. Lancet. 2002 Nov 9;360(9344):1454.