musculoskeletal and connective tissue disorders
Osteomyelitis
Pathophysiology of Osteomyelitis
Osteomyelitis tends to occlude local blood vessels, which causes bone necrosis and local spread of infection. Infection may expand through the bone cortex and spread under the periosteum, with formation of subcutaneous abscesses that may drain spontaneously through the skin. In vertebral osteomyelitis, paravertebral or epidural abscess can develop. If treatment of acute osteomyelitis is only partially successful, low-grade chronic osteomyelitis develops. 