A case report: Diagnosis and treatment of idiopathic hypertrophic pachymeningitis

A 57-year-old man who suffered from a headache for 1 year, accompanied by blurred vision for 7 months and numbness in his left face for 1 week was admitted to the Affiliated Hospital of Zunyi Medical University on May 7, 2022. One year ago, the patient had no obvious precipitating factor of paroxysmal stabbing pain in the whole skull with dizziness, which could be relieved by oneself after lasting for 1-2 min each time, with about 20 episodes per day. The cranial magnetic resonance imaging revealed changes in bilateral frontal lobe ischemic foci, bilateral frontal, ethmoid, sphenoid and maxillary sinusitis, and retinal macular degeneration. After hormone shock treatment, the condition improved. He suffered from headaches again with blurred vision in the right eye 7 months ago and was initially diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. He then was discharged after improvement due to hormone shock therapy. Oral hormone therapy was continued outside the hospital, but he stopped it due to drug side effects (details remained unclear). After cutting off, he developed a headache and visited our hospital once more, the relevant tests were performed and the patient was diagnosed with idiopathic hypertrophic pachymeningitis (IHP). The symptoms were slightly abated after hormone therapy. We hope that through this case report, we can deepen the clinicians' understanding of IHP, and improve the diagnosis rate of the disease through relevant examinations in future clinical work, so that patients can receive timely treatment and the mental pressure and economic burden caused by the disease on patients are reduced.