Neurosyphilis : $b Modern systematic diagnosis and treatment presented in one hundred and thirty-seven case historiesSouthard, Elmer Ernest
Science
Neurosyphilis : $b Modern systematic diagnosis and treatment presented in one hundred and thirty-seven case histories
Southard, Elmer Ernest
Neurosyphilis
=Diagnosis=: The nystagmus, optic atrophy, and the reflex disorder
suggested multiple sclerosis, although the liveliness of the superficial
reflexes, especially the abdominal reflexes, was a point somewhat
against any advanced degree of multiple sclerosis. It would appear that
the absence of pupillary reaction to accommodation is also rather
unusual in multiple sclerosis.
The serum and spinal fluid W. R.’s proved positive. There were 25 cells
per cmm., albumin was in excess, and there was a positive globulin
reaction.
1. What is the significance of optic atrophy and other optic changes
with respect to neurosyphilis? Canavan, from our laboratory, has
reported that she found that 40 of 58 unselected cases of mental
disease exhibited obvious and undeniably important changes in the
optic nerve. She found that optic nerve changes were even more
frequent than chronic spinal cord changes as detectable by the
same method (Weigert myelin sheath method); there were only 34 of
the 58 cases which showed chronic spinal cord changes. Eighteen
cases very probably syphilitic (although the clinical evidence was
not in all cases supported by the W. R.) failed to show optic
nerve changes in but three instances. The 15 syphilitic cases that
did show optic nerve changes showed them in but one eye in three
cases, in both eyes in 12 cases. Canavan incidentally demonstrated
a spirochetosis in the pial sheath of the optic nerve in a case of
neurosyphilis, possibly paretic.
2. What is the frequency of eye changes in neurosyphilis? Posey and
Spiller (“The Eye and the Nervous System,” 1906) quote Kéraval as
finding 42 instances of fundus change in 51 cases of paresis.
Clifford Allbutt found 41 cases of atrophy in 53 of paresis; other
authors have found far fewer. Optic atrophy sufficiently marked to
cause blindness is relatively rare in paresis. Compare table of
eye changes from Joffroy under Case Falvey (55).
As for optic atrophy in tabes, Posey and Spiller record statistics
as so various as to be on the whole unsatisfactory. The highest
percentages found appear to be those of Mott, 80%, and Gross, 88%.
It is evident that the standards for measuring optic atrophy must
differ very much.
=Atypical case of neurosyphilis. Picture of Huntington’s chorea.=
=Case 72.= Margaret Green, 28, was received at Danvers State Hospital in
an excited and frightened state. She was very talkative and said that
she was being bitten by snakes and serpents. She thought every one
approaching her was the devil, and sprinkled what she called “holy
water” about her for protection. It was clear that she was hallucinated.
She heard her child crying, and she saw a woman carrying it away.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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