CEREBRAL NECROSIS IN SICKLE CELL DISEASE

Abstract

Since Herrick in 1910 first pointed out the peculiar sickling tendency of red blood cells in the condition now generally (though inaccurately) called sickle cell anemia, various clinical manifestations of the disease have been recognized, and systemic involvement is probably much commoner than is usually realized. Few cases of involvement of the central nervous system have been recorded in the literature, and for this reason I am putting on record the following case of sickle cell disease with neurologic phenomena in which extensive cerebral necrosis due to the sickling tendency of the red blood cells was found at autopsy. <h3>REPORT OF CASE</h3> A. J., a Negro woman aged 20, unmarried, entered the Huey P. Long Hospital at Pineville, La., Aug. 28, 1941 and died three days later. The history was not satisfactory. She complained chiefly of headache, right-sided deafness and drowsiness. The headache and deafness had appeared at the same