Archive for April, 2008

15
Apr

Now coxsackie A-9

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Now coxsackie A-9; the reason I’m showing this is that this can cause rashes, maculopapular and petechial rashes, but it can also have vesicular and urticarial lesions. These frequently get misdiagnosed as contact dermatitis or poison ivy and bug bites. So this is a child who happens to have coxsackie A-9, has lesions that were quite pruritic and they look like papular urticaria. They look like bug bites. Urticaria around a central vesicular lesion. This is another enterovirus that looks like bug bites on this child, and this child as well. Also urticaria, large urticaria. This occurs in outbreaks that the first thing a lot of people think of are foods, but if you have this with fever it’s likely a viral infection, and it can be several different viruses, but particularly in the summertime, enteroviruses. This is a child that looks a little bit like having chicken pox but went on to have lesions that look like those you see in allergic purpura, and went on to have massive purpura that you see here. Looking like DIC, although she was not that sick. This for comparison is a child with scabies. If you scrape these lesions, if you scrape these other lesions you get nothing. You just get some normal epithelial cells if you do it vigorously. Whereas if you scrape poison ivy or if you scrape bug bites they are loaded with eosinophils. Here you can see the organism as well.
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The last of these is hand-foot-and-mouth syndrome, and this is the most distinctive enanthem/exanthem complex. The main etiology is coxsackie A-16 but this has been seen with other enteroviruses but in outbreak circumstances it has mainly been A-16. Or when it’s described to other viruses, they don’t usually have the complete syndrome. Most recently in Hong Kong and Taiwan they had an outbreak with enterovirus 71 and they described cases of hand-foot-and-mouth. The lesions most common on hands and then the feet and buttocks. The peripheral distribution is distinct and occasionally they will go away and then come back. So you will have recurring lesions and sometimes they’ll be chronic with immune defects and sometimes with no apparent immune defects. Chronic reoccurring lesions. This is a classic case of the lesions on the heel of this child and also the buttock. The buttock lesions are usually just maculopapular and not vesicles. This is the tongue of this child’s aunt, which looks like aphthous stomatitis and this is the grandmother of that child with typical lesions on the hands. This is just to show the size of the lesions. The other day I showed you Herpes simplex lesions on the soft palate, and this is almost a 2 cm lesion in the mouth of this particular child.
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Now I’m going to move on to roseola. Roseola and phantom exanthem subitum is a classic pediatric exanthem and about somewhere between 10-30% of children have roseola. It usually will occur in the first two years of life and the illness is fever for 3-5 days. The fever usually falls rapidly and then you have the appearance of the rash. But a lot of physicians just call the first rash they see in a child roseola, which you shouldn’t do. The illness is not seasonal but there have been occasional outbreaks. It has been associated with many different viruses, but recently, relatively recently, herpes virus 6 has been found to be the major cause of this but it’s not the only cause. The Japanese papers on this, the way they did their studies, it was destined to prove this was the cause. So the actual fact is there are multiple etiologies. It seems that this complex of fever and then fever dropping and rash occurring is a host phenomenon relating to multiple different virus antigens, of which the most important is probably herpesvirus 6.
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This is just an example of an outbreak of roseola that occurred in Rochester New York in 1974. This is the outbreak and from a number of these they isolated echovirus 16. So showing you that, at least in outbreak circumstances, enteroviruses may play a role.

10
Apr

Next is toxic shock syndrome

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Next is toxic shock syndrome and this is also a staphylococcal toxin and sometimes a streptococcal toxin. This is similar to the erythrogenic toxin of scarlet fever and very different from exfoliative toxin from phage group II staph. Here the classic disease of course was the epidemic relating to the staphylococcal infections with tampons, which the primary source went unrecognized and the manifestations were the toxic shock. It was actually described first in young children by Jim Todd relating to localized infections with disseminated toxin, usually skin infections. The manifestations; hypotension, clinical or laboratory abnormalities in greater than or equal to three organ systems, and reasonable evidence of ruling out other etiologies. This is desquamation in an adult with toxic shock. This is the sunburn-like rash and this is showing some generalized erythema and conjunctivitis. Just to go back to toxic shock; we occasionally see cases in, for example, group A streptococcal infections with pneumonia. You need to be aware of this. There is evidence now that treating these patients with IVIG benefits, decreases their degree of fever and their morbidity. Canadian drugs online
Okay, the last of the diseases that have some similarity with scarlet fever is erythema infectiosum and this is caused by parvovirus B19. It has a case-to-case interval of 6-14 days. The important thing is that after exposure about a week later you are contagious, but generally asymptomatic or have a mild fever. Then a week after that the rash occurs and at that time the patient is no longer contagious. The rash starts on the face with a “slapped cheek” appearance. The original rash starts centrally, spreads peripherally, is not very diagnostic, but takes on a lace-like pattern. The rash is more prominent on extensive surfaces and adults have arthralgias and arthritis. This is a classic picture from almost 100 years ago, showing the slapped cheek appearance with circumoral pallor. This is a little boy with a real disease. Not too unhappy. This is a picture of a lace-like rash and here is a photograph of what it looks like. The big issue of parvovirus B19 we’ve already mentioned as far as infection in pregnant women.
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Now I want to switch over and talk a bit about enteroviruses, and I’m going to say more at the end about enteroviruses. But a lot of clinical manifestations can occur with enterovirus infections. This is … almost 40 years ago I occupied my time studying these things so everybody yawns when I try to make a big deal out of this. So I’m just going to go through and give you some major manifestations of what you should be aware of. Then we’ll come back and talk specifically about enterovirus epidemiology. I’m going to talk about EcHO-9 coxsackie A-9 and coxsackie A-16 as examples. EcHO virus 9 was the first of the enteroviruses to be well characterized with exanthems, with exanthem and aseptic meningitis. That you have fever, headache, nuchal rigidity, nausea, vomiting, various findings relating to aseptic meningitis. Rash occurs in about one-third of the cases but it’s adversely related to age. The older you are, the less likely you are to have rash. Other findings are typical enterovirus manifestations. The rash is rubelliform, erythematous, maculopapular, discreet. Generally starts centrally. It looks like this, and there are also some petechiae here. This is another child with petechial lesions. So the important thing here is that you have an illness with fever, some evidence of meningitis and on LP they have aseptic meningitis. The cell count usually in the meningitis has a predominance of polys early and you have petechiae popping out right in front of you as well as a rash. So the big thing is differential from meningococcemia. And this you can’t do. You are not able to do this clinically so when you have that scenario with fever you need to treat these patients as if they have meningococcemia. Now this is not only due to EcHO-9. You see this with multiple other enteroviruses. Just to show you some pictures. These almost ulcerative purpuric lesions look like meningococcemia. This is a child with a coxsackie A-9 infection. This by comparison is a child with meningococcemia. So the message is that you can have these enterovirus exanthems even without meningitis and they look like meningococcemia, and you need to treat them as if they were. You can’t differentiate them and sometimes, for example at Ft. Leonard Wood, actually both were circulating at the same time and there were cases that had meningococcemia during the outbreak of EcHO type 9 disease.
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10
Apr

Kawasaki Syndrome

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Kawasaki’s disease is a disease of unknown etiology. The manifestations relate to super-antigen formation and it is a multi-system inflammatory disease. And the main thing is fever of five days or more and then four of the remaining five manifestations. The definition is a surveillance definition and I think one of the take-home messages is that you should be prepared, in young children, to treat patients even though they don’t have four or five of the manifestations. There are certain things that just seeing it alone, and that is changes in the extremities, edema, induration of the hands and feet, is enough to strongly suspect Kawasaki’s disease if you don’t have another etiology.
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Other findings are conjunctival injection, mouth lesions, fissuring, crusting of the lips, strawberry tongue. The induration of the hands and feet in a child under a year is diagnostic in itself. Rash of quite variability and the least common manifestation is enlarged lymph nodes, even thought the original description included lymph nodes in the title. Associated with this is evidence of multi-system pyuria, various other findings. Important is aseptic meningitis and this should help you with the diagnosis, not turn you away from the diagnosis such as I have seen in one case.
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This is a picture and the rash can be multiforme, it can be just erythematous maculopapular, more important thing here is the swelling of the hands. The scleral conjunctivitis. This is late in the illness, the desquamation in the tips of the fingers and this is desquamation in the feet. This is the red palm, one of the original papers from Japan. Strawberry tongue in a Kawasaki’s patient. Now the crucial thing here, or the main problem with Kawasaki’s disease, are giant aneurysms of multiple different arteries, and the important ones are coronary arteries leading to infarcts. So patients need to be treated and you need to make a decision. With fever for a few days you have a lot of differentials of which Kawasaki’s is sort of at the bottom. Once you get beyond five days there are less differential possibilities and you want to treat by ten days. Human growth hormone information

Treatment is IVIG, and the most usual treatment today is 2 gm/kg over 12 hours. Also for inflammation, aspirin in high dose, four doses a day at 100 mg/kg. Then later put the patient on long-term aspirin for the anticoagulant effect. There are differences in this but certainly you need to wait until evidence of acute inflammation is over. There is no evidence that aspirin has any benefit as far as the heart is concerned, but there is evidence that IVIG treatment is beneficial. The other thing is that one dose is frequently not enough, so roughly 25% of patients need one or more doses, particularly in the children under a year.

08
Apr

Etiology. Treatment

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Etiology. The cause of narcolepsy has not yet been determined. Although a high association of certain class II human leukocyte antigens (HLAs) with narcolepsy accompanied by cataplexy suggests an immunologic pathogenesis, clinical evidence is lacking. The incidence of DR2 or DQwl antigens is estimated to exceed 90 percent in European, Caucasian, African-American and Japanese patients with narcolepsy associated with cataplexy. However, class II HLA typing is not a routine diagnostic test; these antigens may be present in non-narcoleptic patients, and some patients with narcolepsy associated with cataplexy do not carry these antigens.
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Diagnosis. The diagnosis of narcolepsy is based on an overnight polysomnogram, which evaluates for sleep apnea, periodic limb movements of sleep or other causes of disturbed nocturnal sleep, and a multiple sleep latency test (MSLT) performed the following day. Positive MSLT results are required to confirm the diagnosis. This test consists of a series of four to five nap trials that objectively measure severity of daytime sleepiness. The primary parameters of interest are sleep latency and the presence of sleep-onset REM. Sleep latency refers to the amount of time that it takes a patient to fall asleep. A sleep latency period of less than five minutes is indicative of a pathologic sleepy state, and a sleep latency period of five to 10 minutes suggests pathologic sleepiness. Sleep-onset REM refers to REM sleep that occurs within 10 minutes after sleep onset.
About narcolepsy at wikipedia.org
An average sleep latency of less than 10 minutes and sleep-onset REM in at least two nap trials are required to establish the diagnosis. Because sleep-onset REM can occur with REM-sleep deprivation from sleep apnea, sleep-wake schedule disturbances or drug or alcohol withdrawal, an overnight polysomnogram is used to help exclude such causes. A two-week period of alcohol or drug abstinence is required before an MSLT; abstinence may be confirmed with a drug screen before the study.

Treatment. Attempts to treat narcolepsy are often unsuccessful. Excessive daytime sleepiness and cataplexy are particularly difficult to treat. The mainstay of treatment for excessive daytime sleepiness is a combination of several planned daily naps and central nervous system stimulants, such as pemoline (Cylert), methylphenidate or amphetamine sulfate. To avoid development of tolerance to these agents, weekly drug vacations of one to two days are recommended. Cataplexy, sleep paralysis and hypnagogic hallucinations may be treated with tricyclic antidepressants, such as clomipramine, imipramine (Tofranil), nortriptyline and protriptyline, and serotonin reuptake inhibitors, such as fluoxetine (cheap Prozac online). Use of these drugs for this indication is not FDA-approved.
Coping with narcolepsy
Learning as much about narcolepsy as possible and finding a support system can help patients and families deal with the practical and emotional effects of the disorder, possible occupational limitations, and situations that might cause injury. A variety of educational and other materials are available from sleep medicine or narcolepsy organizations.

Support groups exist to help persons with narcolepsy and their families.

To imagine what a person with narcolepsy copes with daily, keep in mind that while many are not sleep-deprived (in the classical sense), a major symptom of narcolepsy is akin to sleep deprivation in a normal person; as a normal person, imagine going years functioning off just 3-4 hours of sleep per night. While lifestyle changes and drug therapy can help largely mitigate many symptoms of narcolepsy, there currently exists no complete and permanent solution, therefore patience, empathy and self-education are excellent coping tools.
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Individuals with narcolepsy, their families, friends, and potential employers should know that:
Narcolepsy is a life-long condition that may require continuous medication.
Although there is no cure for narcolepsy at present, several medications can help reduce its symptoms.
People with narcolepsy can lead productive lives with proper medical care and lifestyle changes.
A major physiological and physical effect of narcolepsy is roughly akin to the effects of sleep deprivation; such effects can often be controlled and minimized through a combination of lifestyle changes and drug therapy.
Individuals with narcolepsy should avoid jobs that require driving long distances or handling hazardous equipment or that require alertness for lengthy periods (especially where the consequences of falling asleep are dangerous to themselves or others).
Parents, teachers, spouses, and employers should be aware of the symptoms of narcolepsy. This will help them avoid the mistake of confusing the person’s behavior with laziness, hostility, rejection, or lack of interest and motivation. It will also help them provide essential support and cooperation.
Employers can promote better working opportunities for individuals with narcolepsy by permitting special work schedules and nap breaks.
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08
Apr

Narcolepsy

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Narcolepsy is a chronic disorder of unknown etiology. Its usual onset is during the second or third decade of life, and it rarely occurs before age five or after age 50. The disorder is seen with equal frequency in men and women. The case described includes the cardinal features of narcolepsy: excessive daytime somnolence, sleep paralysis, hypnagogic hallucinations (vivid dream-like hallucination at sleep onset) and cataplexy. However, patients rarely experience the full tetrad of symptoms. Narcolepsy results, in part, from an inappropriate intrusion of REM sleep, with its properties of atonia and visual hallucinations, into wakefulness and other stages of sleep. Excessive daytime sleepiness is the most common complaint and precedes episodes of daytime sleep attacks. This symptom is often associated with impaired memory, poor attention and concentration and automatic behavior.
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Sleep paralysis and hypnagogic hallucinations occur when REM-associated atonia and vivid dream-like visual hallucinations, respectively, intrude into the transition between wakefulness and sleep. During sleep paralysis, the patient is conscious but unable to move the limbs. Hypnagogic hallucinations occur at sleep onset. Hypnopompic hallucinations occur on awakening. Both sleep paralysis and hypnagogic hallucinations can occur in patients without narcolepsy when normal sleep patterns are disrupted.
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Cataplexy is a cardinal feature of narcolepsy. It represents the intrusion of REM-associated atonia into wakefulness. For a few seconds or, rarely, a few minutes, a loss of axial and/or appendicular muscle tone occurs without loss of consciousness. The longer the episode, the more likely it is to lead directly into REM sleep. This phenomenon is often precipitated by extremes in emotion, such as anger, fear, excitement or, most commonly, laughter. It may occur several times daily or not at all. Cataplexy is particularly dangerous if it occurs while a patient is driving, bathing or swimming. Disturbed nocturnal sleep, characterized by frequent awakenings and body movements, is a common complaint, but is not a major cause of excessive daytime sleepiness. The incidence of sleep apnea and periodic limb movements of sleep in patients with narcolepsy is higher than that seen in the general population, but treatment of these two conditions does not improve daytime sleepiness.

04
Apr

Syphilis

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Syphilis. Secondary stage is when you get meningovascular syphilis. If you have a 35-year-old person with a stroke, think meningovascular syphilis. In the secondary stage you can have a meningitis. It’s a subacute meningitis, catches cranial nerves very easily, just like TB. Second, third, sixth, all kinds of cranial nerves are caught. Subacute meningitis in a young person, the tempo is a little slow, keep syphilis in mind. The tertiary stage which comes five, six years after the primary exposure, the secondary stage comes about two or three years after exposure. That’s when you get meningitis and stroke. The tertiary stage comes after five or ten years. There are two disorders you need to remember. One, obviously is tabes dorsalis; shooting pain, proprioceptive loss, ataxia, bladder problem with Argyll-Robinson pupil. Tabes dorsalis. Charcot’s joints. Big destroyed swollen joints. Tabes dorsalis. GPI is general paralysis of the insane. Subacute or short chronic dementia. Personality change, dementia coming on over 4-6 months in a 45-year-old person. Rather than a 70-year-old person with two year dementia, which is Alzheimer’s. GPI is four, five, six months of dementia. Very important. They have motor findings; dysarthria, hip tremor, provigil. GPI.

Cysticercosis. The fluid that the cyst has apparently is very irritating to the brain. In fact, people apparently die when you remove the cyst. So treat with praziquantel or albendazole. Occasionally you may need to shunt. If the patient just has seizures, give them seizure drugs.
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Slow viruses. Kuru, New Guinea, Creutzfeldt-Jakob, dementia, myoclonus, basal ganglia problems. Maybe cortical blindness, maybe ataxia, periodic complexes. The CSF is normal. They die in about a year, at the most two. PML we talked about. JC virus, white matter. What does this do? Gertsmann’s-Strausler syndrome? What’s the main sign and symptom? Cerebellar ataxia, positive family history. So the differential diagnosis for Creutzfeldt-Jakob in a way is Gertsmann’s-Strausler. But look carefully for family history. SSPE: post-measles, younger people. The EEG complexes are high in amplitude but less frequent.