Ophthalmoplegia, demyelinating neuropathy, leukoencephalopathy, myopathy, and gastrointestinal dysfunction with multiple deletions of mitochondrial DNA: a mitochondrial multisystem disorder in search of a name.

This article describes a 37-year-old woman with progressive external ophthalmoplegia, peripheral neuropathy, and chronic intractable diarrhea. Laboratory studies disclosed lactic acidosis, ragged red fibers lacking cytochrome c oxidase, high-normal muscular mitochondrial enzymes, demyelinating neuropathy, leukoencephalopathy and multiple mitochondrial DNA deletions. This is the fourth patient described with this clinical syndrome, which represents a separate entity among multisystemic mitochondrial disorders. The patient described here is the first with this syndrome to have multiple mitochondrial DNA deletions.