A case report of a patient with dermatomyositis as a prodromal sign of lung cancer.

Dermatomyositis (DM) is a connective tissue disease characterized by specific inflammatory lesions in muscle biopsy. It is caused by vasculitis determined by humoral factors with subsequent inflammatory cell accumulation, mainly T CD4+ and B cells, which infiltrate myocytes leading to its vacuolization and degeneration (mainly in the skeletal muscles, rarely in the smooth muscles). The incidence of DM is estimated at 1-10 per million in adults and at 1-3.