What is rheumatology (see)

  Rheumatology is a department that mainly diagnoses and treats rheumatic and immunologic diseases, with female patients being the most common.  Rheumatic diseases are a group of diseases with bone, joint and muscle as the main lesions, which can be divided into 10 categories and more than 100 kinds of diseases. The Department of Rheumatology and Immunology is specially set up for the diagnosis and treatment of these diseases.  In addition, the Department of Rheumatology and Immunology is also responsible for diagnosing and treating some “difficult and miscellaneous diseases” in internal medicine, such as “recurrent fever causes to be investigated”, “multiple organ function impairment to be investigated”, and “persistent rash”. The Department of Internal Medicine is also responsible for the diagnosis and treatment of “difficult diseases” such as “recurrent fever for investigation”, “multiple organ damage for investigation”, “persistent rash”, “multiple mucosal ulcers”. Such diseases may be symptoms of a certain rheumatic immune disease or may be caused by a non-rheumatic immune disease, and rheumatologists are responsible for finding out whether there is an etiology and differential diagnosis in terms of immune abnormalities.  In addition, the rheumatology department is also responsible for the treatment of rheumatologic diseases and anti-rheumatic drug-related complications, such as immune liver injury, hormone-related osteoporosis, secondary pulmonary interstitial fibrosis, and secondary pulmonary hypertension.  Therefore, any symptoms and signs suspected of rheumatic diseases that are difficult to be explained by conventional diseases should be promptly seen by the Department of Rheumatology and Immunology.