We report the case of a 78-year-old man who showed a subacute onset of severe cognitive impairment, ataxia, tremor, stimulus sensitive myoclonus and hypophonia. Since a few weeks, he received a treatment with a combination of tricyclic antidepressants for mood disorder. The clinical picture mimicked Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD), but we could rule out this diagnosis by means of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) analysis, which showed normal level of tau protein and Aß1-42, being also negative for CSF 14-3-3 protein. A complete clinical recovery was observed after the discontinuation of antidepressants. So far, some cases of drug-induced CJD-like syndrome have been described. In our experience, early CSF analysis shows high diagnostic usefulness in order to exclude CJD.
Paoletti, F. P., Di Gregorio, M., Calabresi, P., Parnetti, L., Drug-induced Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease-like syndrome: Early CSF analysis as useful tool for differential diagnosis, <<BMJ CASE REPORT>>, 2018; 11 (1): N/A-N/A. [doi:10.1136/bcr-2018-224314] [http://hdl.handle.net/10807/171596]
Drug-induced Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease-like syndrome: Early CSF analysis as useful tool for differential diagnosis
Calabresi, P.;
2018
Abstract
We report the case of a 78-year-old man who showed a subacute onset of severe cognitive impairment, ataxia, tremor, stimulus sensitive myoclonus and hypophonia. Since a few weeks, he received a treatment with a combination of tricyclic antidepressants for mood disorder. The clinical picture mimicked Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD), but we could rule out this diagnosis by means of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) analysis, which showed normal level of tau protein and Aß1-42, being also negative for CSF 14-3-3 protein. A complete clinical recovery was observed after the discontinuation of antidepressants. So far, some cases of drug-induced CJD-like syndrome have been described. In our experience, early CSF analysis shows high diagnostic usefulness in order to exclude CJD.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.