Editorial Periodic Disease, Recurrent Polyserositis, Familial Mediterranean Fever, or simply 'FMF'

It was only 40 years ago that the genetically determined disease variously known as familial Mediterranean fever (or FMF), periodic disease, periodic fever, periodic peritonitis, familial paroxysmal polyserositis and recurrent polyserositis with its preference for certain ethnic groups- Jews, Arabs, Armenians and perhaps less frequently, Turks- was clearly documented [1]. Several large series of cases have since been described [1-5]. In the early accounts the majority of patients had a Jewish origin- usually Sephardic or Iraqi and less frequently Ashkenazic [1—4]. However, other groups around the Mediterranean littoral are also at risk, especially Armenians [5]. Farther afield many sporadic cases have been reported; a recent report, for example, has described familial Mediterranean fever (FMF) in a 16-year-old Hindu boy in Pondicherry, South India [6]. In this issue of The Quarterly Journal of Medicine, a large study comprising 175 Arabs with the disorder (seen over an 11-year period) is reported from Kuwait [7]. The importance of delineating the characteristics of affected individuals including their ethnic status is far from being simply an academic exercise designed to extend our knowledge of physical anthropometric markers and genetic drift. The main importance lies in the fact that the most serious complication of the disorder- renal amyloidosis- has bee