Pediatric Rheumatology FAQ

​​​Is your child complaining of joint pain or stiffness? Dr. Daniel Reiff answers your questions on what a pediatric rheumatologist does, what autoimmune disease is and what parents can expect at a pediatric rheumatology appointment.

• Transcript

  A pediatric rheumatologist is a doctor that specializes in treating children that have autoimmune diseases or diseases where the immune system, instead of fighting off viruses and bacteria like it’s supposed to, for whatever reason gets confused and starts to attack the child’s body itself. It can affect anywhere from the joints and the skin to the internal organs, brain, pretty much any body part can be affected by the immune system and create an autoimmune disease and pediatric rheumatologists really work at treating those illnesses and diagnosing those illnesses.

  At a pediatric rheumatologist appointment what we usually do is a very thorough history, really looking at the symptoms, looking at how the symptoms affect your child’s life, if there’s any medical history, family medical history, anything that’s relevant, could be relevant to the symptoms and complaints and then we do a very thorough physical examination to look at all the joints, skin, eyes, abdomen, heart, lungs, pretty much everything to make sure that we’re not seeing anything that’s affecting any part of the body. And once we get through the physical and the history, we’re able to really kind of tease out what may be the problem and at that point we can discuss any lab work, any imaging, any pictures that need to be taken to figure out what’s going on with the child.