Calcium pyrophosphate dihydrate crystal deposition disease revisited

Description: deposition disease is the most common crystalline arthropathy (1), the onginal discovery of intraarticular CPPD crystals did not occur until 1961 and 1962, when McCarty and others (2,3) identified nonurate crystals in the joint fluid of patients who had goutlike attacks of arthritis. These crystals were characterized by their weak positive birefringence at polarized light microscopy, a finding that distinguished them from the sodium urate crystals of gout. After this discovery, McCarty et al realized that radiographic characteristics of this arthropathy had been previously described by Zitnan and Sitaj (4,5), who had termed the disorder “chondrocalcinosis polyarticulans.� They evaluated radiographs of 27 patients with articular chondrocalcinosis, 21 of whom were members of five different Hungarian families.
Calcium pyrophosphate dihydrate crystal deposition disease revisited. Steinbach LS, Resnick D. Radiology. 1996 Jul;200(1):1-9.