New ways of diagnosing Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease are emerging

New ways of diagnosing Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease are emerging

The diagnosis of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease is based on clinical and electroencephalographic criteria. Surrogate markers incerebrospinal fluid can also aid diagnosis. On page 577 Otto etal report that a highly sensitive serum assay for brain specificS100 protein can be used to distinguish Creutzfeldt-Jakob diseasefrom other diseases which cause dementia (sensitivity 77.8%, andspecificity 81.1%). New variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease is possiblyrelated to the causative agent of bovine spongiform encephalopathy.In view of the public health implications, the accurate ascertainmentof cases is vital but difficult. On p 593 da Silva et al describeusing single photon emission computed tomography with HMPAO toidentify two cases of new variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. Theystress that the tomography findings are not diagnostic, but thatabnormalities particularly in the setting of normal electroencephalographyor cerebral magnetic resonance imaging should raise the suspicionof new variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. Highly specialised "diagnostic"techniques can then be targeted at these patients.

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Single photon emission computed tomography in the identification of new variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease: case reports: Rajith de Silva, James Patterson, Donald Hadley, Aline Russell, Martin Turner, and Martin Zeidler
BMJ 1998 316: 593-594. [Extract] [Full Text] [PDF]