Experience with Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in a single referral center in Mexico. Case series

Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) is a rapidly progressive and fatal central nervous system disease caused by prions.

To present the main clinical and paraclinical characteristics of patients with probable CJD in a referral center of Latin America.

Retrospective study of patients diagnosed with rapidly progressive dementia between 2014 and 2019. Clinical, demographic, electroencephalogram, magnetic resonance imaging, and 14-3-3 protein characteristics were included, as well as positron-emission tomography (PET) data when available.

Twenty-four patients met the criteria for sporadic CJD (75% were women). Mean age was 59.29 ± 11.67 years, while mean disease duration from symptom onset to hospital admission was 7.41 ± 6.54 months. The most common first symptom was behavioral changes (41.7%). Delta wave complexes prevailed (54.2%) on electroencephalogram, cortical hyperintensity (83.3%) on magnetic resonance and frontal hypometabolism (37.5%) on PET. Seven cases showed positive total Tau; five, positive 14-3-3 protein; and three, positive phosphorylated tau on cerebrospinal fluid analysis.

There is significant clinical heterogeneity regarding initial symptoms. Auxiliary test findings were consistent with those of other series.