title: [South American blastomycosis--a differential diagnosis to tuberculous meningitis].
abstract: BACKGROUND
  South American blastomycosis is primarily a lung infection often complicated by multiorgan or intracranial disease.
  
  
  METHODS
  We describe the clinical and pathological findings of fatal cerebral blastomycosis occurring in a woman that immigrated to Norway from Brazil 23 years earlier.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The clinical symptoms together with the radiological findings of multiple cerebral lesions and thickening of the basal meninges were interpreted as cerebral tuberculosis. Examination of cerebral spinal fluid was inconclusive. A diagnosis of cerebral fungal infection was subsequently established by brain biopsy.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This case history stresses the importance of confirming a clinical diagnosis by brain biopsy and extended investigation of the cerebrospinal fluid when intracranial lesions may have an infectious origin.
authors.affiliation: Patologisk anatomisk avdeling, Ullevål sykehus 0407 Oslo. jan.mahlen@ioks.uio.no
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Maehlen
authors.forename: E H
authors.initials: EH
authors.lastname: Strøm
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Gerlyng
authors.forename: B H
authors.initials: BH
authors.lastname: Heger
authors.forename: W J
authors.initials: WJ
authors.lastname: Orderud
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Syversen
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Solgaard
mesh_terms: D003937:Diagnosis, Differential; D017809:Fatal Outcome; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D016921:Meningitis, Fungal / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000473:pathology; D008875:Middle Aged; D010229:Paracoccidioidomycosis / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000473:pathology; D014390:Tuberculosis, Meningeal / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000473:pathology