[POEMS syndrome. Report of a case and review of the literature].

A 47 years old male with POEMS syndrome is presented. His illness started seven months before admission. He was in poor general conditions and had malnutrition. He had cutaneous hyperpigmentation, skin changes, hepatomegaly, edema of the limbs, quadriplegia, myotatic reflexes abolished, hypotrophy of muscular masses and bilateral papilledema. Immunoglobulins IgA and IgM were abnormal. Bone scanning showed multiple lytic lesions. The study of bone marrow showed megaloblastic changes. Electromyography revealed severe neuropathy and biopsy from sural nerve showed severe demyelinization. At first, he showed improvement with steroids; nevertheless he died two months afterwards from possible bronchoaspiration. The autopsy revealed changes compatible with the clinical diagnosis and in addition an adenoma of the hypophysis. We emphasize the importance of POEMS syndrome in the differential diagnosis of polyneuropathies.