West Nile virus encephalomyelitis with polio-like paralysis & nigral degeneration.
BACKGROUND
Patients infected with West Nile virus (WNV) may develop acute neurologic disease, which can be severe or even fatal, including WNV meningitis, encephalitis, and an irreversible acute flaccid paralysis or poliomyelitis-like syndrome. Movement disorders have also been described.


METHODS
We report combined neuronal loss, gliosis, and neurofibrillary tangle formation in the substantia nigra of a 41-year-old man with a history of WNV encephalomyelitis and poliomyelitis-like paralysis.


CONCLUSIONS
Clinically our patient did not display parkinsonism, however, it is interesting to speculate whether, in the absence of the residual subacute poliomyelitis-like syndrome, the neuropathologic findings could have eventually evolved clinically into WNV-associated postencephalitic parkinsonism.
Schafernak
Kristian T
KT
Division of Neuropathology, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, 710 N. Fairbanks Court., Olson 3-459, Chicago, Illinois 60611, USA.
Bigio
Eileen H
EH
D004797:Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay; D017809:Fatal Outcome; D005911:Gliosis / Q000473:pathology; D006801:Humans; D007075:Immunoglobulin M / Q000134:cerebrospinal fluid; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D016874:Neurofibrillary Tangles / Q000473:pathology; D010243:Paralysis / Q000209:etiology*; D011051:Poliomyelitis / Q000150:complications; D013116:Spinal Cord / Q000473:pathology; D013378:Substantia Nigra / Q000473:pathology*; D014901:West Nile Fever / Q000150:complications* / Q000473:pathology* / Q000503:physiopathology; D014902:West Nile virus / Q000276:immunology
D007075:Immunoglobulin M