Diagnosis and treatment in inflammatory neuropathies
- 1Centre for Neuromuscular Disease, National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, London, UK
- 2Division of Clinical Neurosciences, Southern General Hospital, Glasgow, UK
- Correspondence to Dr M P T Lunn, Centre for Neuromuscular Disease and Department of Molecular Neuroscience, National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, Queen Square, London WC1N 3BG, UK; michael.lunn{at}uclh.org
- Received 28 October 2008
- Accepted 13 November 2008
Abstract
The inflammatory neuropathies are a large diverse group of immune-mediated neuropathies that are amenable to treatment and may be reversible. Their accurate diagnosis is essential for informing the patient of the likely course and prognosis of the disease, informing the treating physician of the appropriate therapy and informing the scientific community of the results of well-targeted, designed and performed clinical trials. With the advent of biological therapies able to manipulate the immune response more specifically, an understanding of the pathogenesis of these conditions is increasingly important. This review presents a broad overview of the pathogenesis, diagnosis and therapy of inflammatory neuropathies, concentrating on the most commonly encountered conditions.
Footnotes
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Competing interests None.
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This is a reprint of a paper that appeared in the Journal of Neurology, Neurosurgery, and Psychiatry, March 2009, volume 80, pages 249–58. Reproduced with kind permission of the author and publisher.
