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Case Reports
. 2020 Oct:80:280-281.
doi: 10.1016/j.jocn.2020.07.074. Epub 2020 Sep 30.

Acute myelitis and SARS-CoV-2 infection. A new etiology of myelitis?

Daniel Águila-Gordo  1 , José Manuel Flores-Barragán  2 , Ferran Ferragut-Lloret  3 , Jaime Portela-Gutierrez  3 , Beatriz LaRosa-Salas  4 , Lourdes Porras-Leal  4 , José Carlos Villa Guzmán  3
Affiliations
Case Reports

Acute myelitis and SARS-CoV-2 infection. A new etiology of myelitis?

Daniel Águila-Gordo et al. J Clin Neurosci. 2020 Oct.

Abstract

The etiological agent of coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19), SARS-coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), emerged in Wuhan, China, and quickly spread worldwide leading the World Health Organization (WHO) to recognize it not only as a pandemic but also as an important thread to public health. Beyond respiratory symptoms, new neurological manifestations are being identified such as headache, ageusia, anosmia, encephalitis or acute cerebrovascular disease. Here we report the case of an acute transverse myelitis (TM) in a patient with SARS-CoV-2 infection detected by the nasopharyngeal swab technique but not in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) analysis. Anti-herpes simplex virus (HSV) 1 and varicella-zoster IgM antibodies were not detected in serum samples and spinal and brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) showed no abnormal findings. This case remarks that COVID-19 nervous system damage could be caused by immune-mediated mechanisms.

Keywords: Acute transverse myelitis; COVID-19; Neurological symptoms; SARS-CoV-2.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Sagittal T2-weighted scan shows mild discoarthrosic changes at the C5-C6 level with obliteration of the subarachnoid space without pathological repercussion.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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