COVID‐19‐associated Guillain‐Barre syndrome: Postinfectious alone or neuroinvasive too?. Issue 10 (6th July 2021)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Khan, Farman; Sharma, Praveen; Pandey, Saurabh; Sharma, Deepak; V., Vijayavarman; Kumar, Neeraj; Shukla, Suruchi; Dandu, Himanshu; Jain, Amita; Garg, Ravindra K.; Malhotra, Hardeep S.
• Other Names: Luo Guangxiang (George) guestEditor.; Ly Hinh guestEditor.; Gao Shou‐Jiang guestEditor.
• Is Part Of: Journal of medical virology. Volume 93:Issue 10(2021)
• Page Start: 6045
• Page End: 6049
• Publication Date: 2021-07-06
• Subjects: cerebrospinal fluid -- COVID‐19 -- Guillain‐Barre syndrome -- reverse‐transcriptase polymerase chain reaction; Virology -- Periodicals; 616
• DOI: 10.1002/jmv.27159
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0146-6615

Abstract

Abstract: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) has been shown to be associated with a lot of neurological complications, of whom Guillain‐Barre syndrome (GBS) is an important post‐infectious consequentiality. More than 220 patients with GBS have been reported thus far. We intend to share our experience with five patients of GBS where one of them had severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS‐CoV‐2) in the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). This is the first‐ever report demonstrating the presence of SARS‐CoV‐2 in the CSF of an adult patient; a similar occurrence has recently been described in a pediatric patient. We wish to emphasize the fact that commonly GBS occurs as a result of a post‐infectious process but in a few cases where the symptoms of COVID‐19 and GBS occur concurrently, corresponding to the viremic phase, separate pathogenesis needs to be thought of. This para‐infectious nature is exemplified by the presence of virus in the cerebrospinal fluid of one of our patients. We review the neuroinvasive potential of SARS‐Cov‐2 in this regard and draw parallels with Cytomegalovirus, Zika virus, and Human Immunodeficiency virus‐associated occurrences of GBS.