Recurrent oral aphthosis as the solitary clinical manifestation of Crohn’s disease in children: a case report

Abstract

Crohn's disease is a is a chronic inflammatory bowel disease that affects the digestive tract, where the clinical presentation highly depends on disease localisation. The majority of patients typically present with (bloody) diarrhoea, abdominal pain, weight loss and growth impairment. We describe an atypical case of a nine-year-old boy with chronic aphthosis for more than one year as sole manifestation of Crohn's disease, without other gastrointestinal symptoms, beside intermittent abdominal pain. Even in the absence of biochemical signs of inflammation and negative calprotectin, further investigations are warrant if oral lesions are persistent, deep with a more atypical presentation.