CONDUCTION BLOCK IN VASCULITIC NEUROPATHY

Vasculitis involving peripheral nerves usually presents as an acute as ymmetrical axonal neuropathy. We report a 67-year-old man with a symme trical subacute neuropathy in which nerve conduction studies showed pr ominent conduction block, a finding indicative of demyelination. Sural nerve biopsy showed a vasculitic neuropathy with invasion of blood ve ssel walls by inflammatory cells and a mixture of nerve fiber loss and demyelination. The demyelination in this case was presumably a conseq uence of subinfarctive nerve ischemia. (C) 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Inc .