[Progressive multifocal leukoencephalitis complicating polymyositis].

INTRODUCTION

Progressive multifocal leukoencephalitis (PML) must be evoked in patients presenting with a systemic disease during which multiple neurological deficiencies rapidly worsen.

OBSERVATION: A 17 year-old girl suffering from histologically confirmed polymyositis was treated with corticosteroids. Two years after the diagnosis she exhibited global signs of cerebral damage with fever and magnetic resonance imaging evoked leukoencephalitis.

COMMENTS: An affection of the central nervous system, PML is characterised by the existence of multiple areas of demyelination in the hemispheric white substance of the cerebral trunk and sometimes the cerebellum, whereas the grey substance is usually spared. This entity occurs more frequently in HIV-infected patients, but also in patients in whom the immunodeficiency may have other causes, such as the treatment for a systemic disease for example.