It is described clinically as a bulbous uniform swelling of the soft tissue of the terminal phalanx of a digit with subsequent loss of the normal angle between the nail and the nail bed.
Since Hippocrates first described digital clubbing in patients with empyema, digital clubbing has been associated with various underlying pulmonary, cardiovascular, neoplastic, infectious, hepatobiliary, mediastinal, endocrine, and gastrointestinal diseases. Finger clubbing also may occur, without evident underlying disease
CLUBBING CAUSES:..................CLUBBING
- Cyanotic heart disease
- Lung disease (hypoxia, lung cancer, bronchiectasis, cystic fibrosis)
- UC/Crohn's disease
- Biliary cirrhosis
- Birth defect (harmless)
- Infective endocarditis
- Neoplasm (esp. Hodgkins)
- GI malabsorption