title: Substantial spontaneous long-term remission in subacute sclerosing panencephalitis (SSPE).
abstract: We report a 25-year-old female who developed clinical and electroencephalographic (EEG) features of subacute sclerosing panencephalitis (SSPE) at the age of 17 years. After almost 17 months of progressive neurological deterioration to a level where she was bedridden and incapable of self-care (Risk and Haddad stage 3a), she experienced a substantial spontaneous clinical and EEG remission (stage 4c) which she has maintained for the last 8 years. The measles antibody titer in the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), however, progressively increased during follow-up. There are only very few patients with well documented diagnosis of SSPE who have maintained such a prolonged remission. The age at onset of SSPE of > or = 12 years, disappearance of periodic complexes and a tendency for normalization of the background activity in the EEG, and a progressive increase in the measles antibody titer in the CSF appears to predict a favourable outcome of SSPE.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, Sree Chitra Tirunal Institute for Medical Sciences and Technology, Trivandrum, India.
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Santoshkumar
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Radhakrishnan
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000914:Antibodies, Viral / Q000134:cerebrospinal fluid / Q000276:immunology; D004569:Electroencephalography; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008459:Measles virus / Q000276:immunology; D012075:Remission, Spontaneous; D013344:Subacute Sclerosing Panencephalitis / Q000134:cerebrospinal fluid / Q000473:pathology / Q000503:physiopathology* / Q000821:virology
chemical_list: D000914:Antibodies, Viral