Several French teams including clinicians and researchers have created
a group within the European network for the study of Creutzfeldt-Jako
b disease and other human spongiform encephalopathies. The main object
ies are to monitor the incidence of the disease and to search for poss
ible risk factors with a case-control study. The diagnosis is based on
neuropathological studies or rite identification of an abnormal prote
in prion in cerebral fragments. The sequence of the gene encoding for
the prion protein has was studied from blood or cerebral samples. The
early results indicate that the incidence, mortality and clinical pres
entation remain relatively constant compared with earlier studies. Stu
dying the expression of the 129 codon of the prion protein gene has le
d to the verification that homozygous methionine/methonine forms predo
minate in sporadic forms.