Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, Parkinson's disease, and the amyotrophic lateral sclerosis-Parkinsonism-dementia complex on Guam: a review and summary of attempts to demonstrate infection as the aetiology

In a series of lectures delivered in 1874, Charcot described a new syndrome which he termed amyo- trophlc lateral sclerosis (ALS). At that time he pre- sented the essential pathological and classical characteristics of the disease which, although later modified and refined by himself and subsequent workers, have remained remarkedly classical for ALS during the almost 100 years since they were published. Recently, Goldblatt (1968) has extensively reviewed the literature on motor neurone disease.