Thromboangiitis obliterans (Buerger's disease) with intestinal involvement--a case report.

Thromboangiitis obliterans (TAO) or Buerger's disease is a nonatherosclerotic vascular disease of unknown etiology that occurs almost exclusively in young male tobacco users. The involvement of the medium-sized and small arteries and veins leads to ischemic complaints and trophic changes in the limbs. The authors report a case of Buerger's disease in a 29-year-old man, a heavy smoker, affecting the lower limbs and mesenteric vessels.

Follicular spicules of the nose: a peculiar cutaneous manifestation of multiple myeloma with cryoglobulinemia.

We describe a patient with multiple myeloma and cryoglobulinemia who had spicules with a horny appearance in the follicular openings of the face, particularly on the nose. Histopathologic study demonstrated that these spicules consisted of eosinophilic homogeneous deposits in the intercellular spaces between keratinocytes in the upper layers of the follicular infundibulum. Direct immunofluorescence, ultrastructural, and biochemical investigations revealed that these eosinophilic deposits were cryoprecipitates composed of IgG-kappa with electrophoretic characteristics identical to those of the paraprotein present in the serum of the patient. Hence we believe that these lesions are best referred to as pseudohyperkeratotic spicules of the nose, and that they are a characteristic cutaneous manifestation of patients with multiple myeloma and cryoglobulinemia.