A novel single variant in the MEFV gene causing Mediterranean fever and Behçet’s disease: a case report

Background Familial Mediterranean fever is an autoinflammatory disease of unknown etiology, characterized clinically by recurrent attacks of sudden-onset fever with arthralgia and/or thoracoabdominal pain and pathogenetically by autosomal recessive inheritance due to a mutation in the MEFV gene. Behcet’s disease is an inflammatory disease characterized by recurrent oral and genital aphthous ulcerations, uveitis, and skin lesions. Preliminarily, our literature review suggested that patients with familial Mediterranean fever who also have Behcet’s disease have only a single mutated familial Mediterranean fever gene. The MEFV gene mutation responsible for familial Mediterranean fever is probably a susceptibility factor for Behcet’s disease, particularly for patients with vascular involvement, and both disorders can occur concurrently in a patient, as in the present case.