IMMUNOLOGICAL AND ENDOCRINOLOGIC ABNORMALITIES IN PARANEOPLASTIC DISORDERS WITH INVOLVEMENT OF THE AUTONOMIC NERVOUS-SYSTEM

We report a series of four patients in whom the onset of systemic canc er was heralded by dysautonomic symptoms and a neurological non-metast atic complication mediated by immunological and endocrine factors. The series includes. a patient with acute leukaemia and autonomic sensory -motor polyradiculoneuropathy, a patient affected by colon carcinoma a nd autonomic neuropathy and limbic encephalitis, a patient with lung c ancer and autonomic neuropathy and hypercalcaemic encephalopathy, a pa tient with small cell lung cancer associated with autonomic neuropathy in Lambert-Eaton Myasthenic Syndrome (LEMS) and syndrome of inappropr iate ADN secretion (SIADH). We underline the prognostic importance and discuss the possible etiopathogenetic role of autonomic dysfunction, which is frequently associated with paraneoplastic neurologic syndrome s of autoimmune and/or dysendocrine origin.