Case 3

This patient comes to your ER complaining of joint pain. On further questioning, you also find the patient complains of pain on urination and matting in her eyes in the morning. What is the diagnosis?


A geographic tongue is a loss of pappillae in the tongue that often changes with time. In general, the patient is asymptomatic, and the patient has spontaneous resolution. The georgrapic tongue may be due to psoriasis, Reiter syndrome, lichen planus, herpes simplex virus. systemic lupus erythematosus, drug reaction and leukoplakia. In this case, the other symptoms of arthritis, urethritis and conjunctivitis comprise the triad known as Reiter syndrome. In a related note, the medical establishment is moving away from the term Reiter syndrome as it is named after Nazi physician who described it after experimenting on unwilling patients during World War II.