Scleroderma: oral manifestations.

An oral clinical and radiologic study of twenty-one patients suffering from scleroderma revealed that in one half of the patients the blood sedimentation rate and the antinuclear factor were elevated. When both these laboratory findings were present at the same time, they proved to be well correlated. The majority of the patients had limited mouth opening. Gross jawbone changes affecting the mandibular condyle, coronoid process, and posterior part of the ascending ramus occurred in four patients. There was no correlation in these four patients with regard to the bone changes and clinical and laboratory findings or to age and duration of illness. Widening of the periodontal ligament space, as measured in a meticulous manner, was a feature in all twenty-one patients and in all teeth.