title: Neurological involvement in North Italian patients with Behçet disease.
abstract: The aim of this study was to evaluate neurological involvement in a series of 110 North Italian patients with Behçet disease (BD), a multisystemic vasculitis of unknown origin, followed up for a period of 5 years. During this time, 27 (24.5%) patients with neuro-BD were identified. Twenty out of 27 showed at least one acute attack in their clinical course. In 14 of them, a neurological evaluation was carried out during the attack. The other 13 patients were evaluated during a remission phase. The onset of neuro-BD was usually characterized by an acute attack with motor symptoms (66.6%) and behavioural/cognitive changes (47.6%), while headache was more frequent in the remission phase (76.9%). On magnetic resonance imaging, large brain-stem/diencephalon lesions were usually seen during the attack. In the remission phase, they were often located in the white-matter. Aspecific cerebrospinal fluid abnormalities were usually seen during the attacks. Cerebrospinal fluid analysis together with radiological and clinical features seems to be useful for the differential diagnosis in these patients.
authors.affiliation: Sezione di Reumatologia, Dipartimento di Medicina Clinica e Sperimentale, Università degli Studi di Ferrara, Ferrara, Italy. lmnndr@unife.it
authors.forename: Andrea
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Lo Monaco
authors.forename: Renato
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: La Corte
authors.forename: Luisa
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Caniatti
authors.forename: Massimo
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Borrelli
authors.forename: Francesco
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Trotta
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001528:Behcet Syndrome / Q000150:complications / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000473:pathology; D001921:Brain / Q000473:pathology; D002493:Central Nervous System Diseases / Q000150:complications / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000473:pathology; D002555:Cerebrospinal Fluid / Q000737:chemistry; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003937:Diagnosis, Differential; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007558:Italy; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D013116:Spinal Cord / Q000473:pathology