Study of Raynaud's phenomenon by means of infrared functional imaging

Infrared functional imaging was applied to the study of Raynaud's Phenomenon obtaining a simultaneous assessment of the thermal properties of all five fingers of both hands of a group of patients with respect of a control group. The method is based on the use of high-resolution telethermography imaging and allows identification of objective parameters from the re-warming curves of finger immediately after a 2 min cold stress. The evaluation of the area under the temperature versus time curve, namely the temperature integral INT, provides a figure particularly effective in describing the thermal properties of the finger. 18 healthy volunteers, 20 Secondary Scleroderma and 20 Primary Raynaud's Phenomenon patients were studied subsequently to clinical evaluation and nailfold capillaroscopy. This new approach highlighted a quite different behaviour between patients with Primary Raynaud's Phenomenon and those with early diagnosed Systemic Sclerosis This new method, compared with other existing techniques, seems to be useful tool to discriminate between PRP and RP secondary to SSc.