Guillain-Barré Syndrome Occurring During Cortisone Therapy

The cause of the Guillain-Barre syndrome is still unknown. In the past the most widely held view was that the syndrome was caused by a neurotropic virus; this virus has not yet been identified and has not been transmitted. In recent years the reporting of various other causes has shown a swing in thought toward hypersensitivity as the cause of the syndrome, 1 as the pathological changes reported have been interpreted as more typical of hypersensitivity than of the acute inflammation of infection. 2 For this reason, several patients have been treated with corticotropin (ACTH) or cortisone with apparently good response, which was considered to indicate that the syndrome was based on allergy or hypersensitivity rather than on a direct infection of the central nervous system. 3 The assumption that a response to corticotropin or cortisone rules out an infectious basis is perhaps not valid. Certainly corticotropin or cortisone, while