[Inflammatory muscle diseases].

Inflammatory myopathies are as a rule rare diseases of skeletal muscle. In the majority of cases noninfective autoimmunological reactions are assumed. Only few diseases have an infectious origin. From a myopathological point of view, polymyositis must be selected from interstitial nodular myositis. The most important clinical diagnosis is polymyositis/dermatomyositis. Additional nodular myositis can be found in many other connective tissue diseases. Rare conditions of polymyositis are to be separated from idiopathic cases. The therapy of acute polymyositis or dermatomyositis consists in corticosteroids, if necessary in combination with immunosuppressive drugs.