Transcranial Ultrasound of the Basal Ganglia in Sporadic Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease

To purchase or authenticate to the full-text of this article, please visit this link: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1552-6569.2007.00227.x Byline: Muller Martin (1), Treumann Thomas (1), Hewer Ekkehard (1), Stoeck Katharina (1) Keywords: Basal ganglia disease; Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease; transcranial ultrasound; MRI; 14-3-3 Abstract: ABSTRACT Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) is characterized by the core symptoms of rapid progressive dementia, myoclonus, and typical periodic sharp wave complexes (PSWC) on electroencephalography (EEG). In recent years, imaging techniques have become more and more important in the diagnostic process of CJD. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is very characteristic and the most accurate imaging technique to be of help in diagnosing CJD. In this study, we applied transcranial color-coded ultrasound (TCCS) in three cases of sporadic CJD. We found that all of them had in common a typical ultrasound tissue image of the lentiform nucleus, best to be described as a blurry inhomogeneous hyperechogenic signal pattern where usually the echogenicity is mostly homogeneously hypoechogenic. Author Affiliation: (1)From the Department of Neurology Kantonsspital Lucerne, Spitalstr., Lucerne, Switzerland (MM); Department of Radiology, Kantonsspital Lucerne, Spitalstr., Lucerne, Switzerland (TT); National Reference Centre of Human Prion Diseases (NRPE), Institute of Neuropathology, University Hospital Zurich, CH-8091 Zurich, Switzerland (EH, KS). Article History: Acceptance: Received August 26, 2007, and in revised form August 26, 2007. Accepted for publication October 31, 2007. Article note: Correspondence: Address correspondence to Martin Muller, MD, Department of Neurology, Kantonsspital Lucerne Spitalstr. CH-6000 Lucerne 16. E-mail: martin.mueller@ksl.ch