[Lafora disease and the two first cases of Alzheimer's disease published in Spain]

Gonzalo Rodríguez Lafora (Madrid 1886-1971) finished his neuropathological training in the Nervenklinik in Munich, together with Alzheimer. In 1910 he took over from Achúcarro in the mental hospital in Washington. In 1911, the year he described amylaceous bodies in myoclonic epilepsy, he had the chance to study a demented person, a former soldier in the American Civil War, who had progressive deterioration of his mental functions. Both clinical and anatomopathological studies were very detailed. He shared the discovery of granulovacuolar degeneration with Simchowitz. It was the eighth case in the literature. The second case (and third American patient) in 1914 was a demented person with goitre, also in Washington mental hospital, who was studied by means of a full series of psychological tests, and the autopsy findings were later described. These studies were not published in English, and perhaps for this reason were not as widely known as they should have been.