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In medical literature peripheral neurological disorders are associated with Crohn's disease only in particular cases. We report on two patients who suffering from Crohn's disease developed an acute Guillain-Barré syndrome or a polyneuropathy associated with myositis. Two weeks after a 65-year old female patient developed a serious Guillain-Barré syndrome, a haemorrhagical Crohn's colitis was diagnosed. Within a few weeks the specific therapy led to a satisfying recovery. A 45-year old female had suffered from Crohn's disease since 12 years. Within 8 weeks she developed a serious sensorimotor mixed axonal and demyelinating neuropathy and a granulomatous myositis. After treatment with steroids her signs constantly decreased. These observations as well as a literature review show that polyneuropathy and Guillain-Barré syndrome can be associated with chronic inflammatory bowel diseases. Our results suggest that peripheral neurological signs could be regarded as a possible extraintestinal manifestation of inflammatory bowel disease.

Patient and Method: We report 5 patients, who developed myasthenia, four of them after treatment on D-penicillamine, one after treatment on chloroquine. 3 patients suffered from rheumatoid arthritis, one from a psoriatic arthritis and one from cirrhosis of the liver. Three patients developed an ocular myasthenia, one patient an oculopharyngeal and one patient has had generalized myasthenic syndrome., Results: Four patients showed an improvement of clinical status within days up to 18 months following discontinuation of the therapy, whereas one patient deteriorated. The quickest improvement was observed in the patient with chloroquine induced myasthenia. Four patients had raised acetylcholine-receptor antibody titers. The patient with chloroquine induced myasthenia had had a normal acetylcholin-receptor antibody titer. The human leucocyte antigen type was compared with the results of literature., Conclusion: To what extent human leucocyte antigen type HLA DR 4 has a correlation with the development of myasthenia following treatment on chloroquine can not yet be answered with respect to the very small number of cases at the moment.