Retropharyngeal calcific tendinitis in the neurological emergency unit, report of three cases and review of the literature
Article Category: Review
Published Online: Nov 30, 2023
Page range: 430 - 435
Received: Jul 04, 2023
Accepted: Aug 17, 2023
DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/raon-2023-0045
Keywords
© 2023 Tatjana Filipovic et al., published by Sciendo
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Background
Retropharyngeal calcific tendinitis (RCT) is a relatively benign condition of calcination of the longus colli muscle tendon of unknown origin, which causes severe acute neck pain. However, it is often not recognised, which leads to delayed diagnosis and unnecessary treatment.
Patients and methods
We have searched PubMed and Google Scholar for publications which reported at least one patient with RCT and were published in the last 20 years. The literature was then analysed according to the PRISMA-S protocol. We also report three patients with RCT presenting at the Neurological Emergency Unit, University Medical Centre, Ljubljana, Slovenia, from 1 January 2020 to 1 June 2022. We discuss their clinical presentation and differential diagnosis, explain our decision-making process, and briefly describe the clinical course. Case reports have been performed according to the CARE protocol.
Results
We have analysed a total of 112 titles with 231 patients. The most frequent symptoms and signs were: neck pain, neck stiffness and odynophagia, as was the case in our reported cases.
Conclusions
RCT is a dramatic yet self-limiting condition, often not recognised in time. An effort should be made to increase neurologists’ awareness about this condition.