The sural sensory nerve is usually spared in Guillain-Barre syndrome

Sensory nerve conduction (NC) studies that were performed on patients with Guillain-Barre syndrome (GBS) were reviewed. These were compared with the sensory NC findings in patients with peripheral neuropathy of the axonal-loss type (axonopathies) and chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy (CIDP). In GBS, the sural sensory nerve frequently showed normal NC findings compared to the median and ulnar sensory nerves. The reverse pattern was seen in axonopathies and CIDP, in which the sural nerve showed more abnormalities than the median and ulnar nerves. This pattern of sensory NC abnormalities may assist the examiner in differentiating GBS from other types of peripheral polyneuropathy.