[Etiology of porencephalia and other developmental disorders of the brain in alcoholic embryopathy].

Cerebral hemispheres development was analyzed in 39 embryons obtained after 5 to 12 weeks to gestation in mothers abusing alcohol (alcoholism and drunkenness). In 20 cases (51%) distortions in the brain shaping were detected with excessive plication and invaginations of the brain walls. This led to the brain development disorder known as true porencephalia, and others, termed as cysts with normal and reverse order of layers, porencephalia with reverse layer ordering. The authors suggest that brain shaping distortions are variants of teratogenesis of its innate defects.