Congenital Horner's syndrome

Abstract

Patients with congenital Horner's syndrome (who seemed, on the basis of their clinical history and the distribution fo anhidrosis, to have a preganglionic lesion) had partial mydriatic failure with hydroxyamphetamine hydrobromide and a supersensitivity to phenylephrine hydrochloride. This apparent paradox can be readily explained by postulating an aorthograde transsynaptic dysgenesis of the postganglionic neuron, such as has been demonstrated in the sympathetic nervous system of newborn animals. The failure of hydroxyamphetamine to cause mydriasis indicates damage to the postganglionic sympathetic neuron, but in the neonate this damage may be secondary to a preganglionic lesion.