Pathology cases — osteolytic lesions in a diabetic. What is this?

I have a case of an older man who died at home of diabetic ketoacidosis.  His history is remarkable for DM II, mild CHF, and an episode of electrocution many years ago resulting in amputation of an arm and a number of toes.

On X-ray, he has these osteolytic cyst-like lesions in the tibia and femur bilaterally.  I didn’t explore them at autopsy because they have nothing to do with the cause of death.   These look like they should be diagnostic of something, but I don’t know what.

Any ideas?

 

2 thoughts on “Pathology cases — osteolytic lesions in a diabetic. What is this?”

    1. Yeah, that seems to be the consensus of the folk who have responded (for some reason most folk who read this blog respond by email or on a mailing list). One respondent said that this was called “serpiginous sclerosis.” I guess I should have known that, but I haven’t seen this in long enough that I had forgotten.

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