BRAIN CHANGES ASSOCIATED WITH PERNICIOUS ANEMIA

Abstract

The frequency with which symptoms referrable to the central nervous system occur in anemic patients, particularly if the anemia be of the pernicious, or essential type, has long been recognized and made the object of extensive investigation. While our knowledge of this baffling disease has made wonderful strides since Addison first described it in 1855, we have become more and more embarrassed by the seeming increase of our ignorance, and we need be little surprised when we see the chaotic state our problem was in some twenty years later. At this time, Schuele,¹in an excellent study of three mental cases, in which there co-existed a severe anemia, expressed his opinion in this connection by saying: "It is apparent, granted that muscular degeneration can be of central origin, that anemias of neurogenic origin also exist;" and came to the general conclusion that atrophy of the cerebral cortex was, in his