What is a rheumatic disease many autoimmune connective tissue diseases and vascular conditions in rheumatology have cutaneous manifestations skin signs are useful in the diagnosis of rheumatic disease as they often precede systemic symptoms they can also act as a prognostic marker and predict systemic involvement rheumatic diseases described on this page are. The cutaneous manifestations of rheumatic diseases are extremely numerous and varied a discussion is presented concerning the recognition and management of the most common cutaneous changes seen in the three major rheumatic diseases of interest to dermatology nurses lupus erythematosus dermatomyo . Rheumatoid arthritis is a chronic systemic autoimmune inflammatory arthritis with various extra articular manifestations in this first series examining the cutaneous manifestation of rheumatic diseases we will discuss the most common dermatologic findings in patients with rheumatoid arthritiscutaneous lesions are the most common extra articular findings. Cutaneous manifestations of rheumatic diseases edited by r d sontheimer and t t provost pp 528 gbp116 baltimore williams and wilkins 1996 isbn 0 683 07852 6 the idea for a monograph devoted exclusively to the cutaneous manifestations of rheumatic diseases was conceived by professor james gilliam late chairman of the department of dermatology at university of texas southwestern