-Related Disorders as Key Differential Diagnosis of Cavitating Leukoencephalopathy.

Genetic leukoencephalopathies represent an expanding group of inherited disorders associated with involvement of brain white matter. Cystic degeneration has been previously described with some acquired or inherited leukoencephalopathies. We describe a 6-month-old Brazilian boy with a 2-month history of severe and rapidly progressive developmental and psychomotor regression and seizures.

Early-onset axonal Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease due to SACS mutation.

Axonal Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease (CMT) represents an expanding group of inherited motor and sensory neuropathies in clinical practice. SACS-gene related disorders have been associated with complex neurological phenotypes of early-onset cerebellar ataxia, spastic-ataxia, spastic paraplegia, demyelinating neuropathy and variable ophthalmological, cognitive and psychiatric disturbances, but never related to pure axonal neuropathy phenotypes. Two unrelated Brazilian men with early-onset axonal CMT-like presentations associated with SACS gene mutations are presented.

New genetic causes for complex hereditary spastic paraplegia.

Introduction: Hereditary Spastic Paraplegia (HSP) represents a complex and heterogeneous group of rare neurodegenerative disorders that share a common clinical feature of weakness and lower limb spasticity that can occur alone or in combination with a constellation of other neurological or systemic signs and symptoms. Although the core clinical feature of weakness and lower limb spasticity is virtually universal, the genetic heterogeneity is almost uncountable with more than 70 genetic forms described so far. We performed review of medical records from twenty-one patients from seventeen Brazilian families with complex phenotype of HSP.