The following symptoms and complaints may indicate osteoid osteoma:
Main symptoms
- Severe pain, especially at night, which also radiates to the surrounding area
- Often local pressure pain
- Swelling
- If the nidus (osteoblastic area surrounded by compacted bone) is intraarticular (in the joint capsule), the main symptom is arthritis (inflammation of the joint)
Localization
Typical of primary bone tumors is that they can be assigned to a characteristic localization in addition to a certain age range. They arise clustered at the sites of most intense longitudinal growth (metaepiphyseal/articular area).
The following questions should be answered by diagnostic measures:
- Localization in the skeleton → Which bone is affected?
- Localization in the bone → epiphysis* (joint end of the bone (near the joint)), metaphysis* (transition from epiphysis to diaphysis), diaphysis* (long bone shaft), central, eccentric (not central), cortical (at the solid outer shell of the bone), extracortical, intraarticular (within the joint capsule).
Osteoid osteoma occurs mainly in the dia- and metaphyses of the long tubular bones of femur (thigh bone) and tibia (shin bone), but also in the vertebral bodies.
* Example of the structure of a long bone: epiphysis – metaphysis – diaphysis – metaphysis – epiphysis.
