[Diagnostic difficulties in total infarct in the middle cerebral artery system]

Under study there were 12 cases of total infarction within the median cerebral artery system. The resemblance of this disease with cerebral hemorrhage consists not only in the similarity of the neurological symptoms, but also frequently in analogous shifts on the part of peripheral blood and metabolic processes. For diagnostic differentiation dynamic examinations of cerebrospinal liquor can be used. If the absence of erythrocytes in the liquor is confirmed repeatedly, or they appear later and in an insignificant quantity, the diagnosis of the total infarction becomes almost absolitely correct. If, however, the blood appears in the liquor in a greater amount, an extremely thorough analysis of the clinical course of the disease in comparison with the liquor dynamics is necessary, so as to give a correct interpretation of a particular case of the disease.