Investigation verifies the risk to contract a neurological disorder due to zika infection.

The study was lead by the Johns Hopkins Hospital of United States of America, where 20 professionals of different regions of the country participated. La Misericordia Clinica Internacional was the only health institution of Barranquilla that contributed in one of the biggest and significant investigations done, with the intention of verifying the hypothesis of the relation between the virus and the neurological compromise.

The research group was formed by the neurologist Dr. Jose Vargas, Dra. Karen H. Rizcala and Dra. Maria T. Morales, who work at our institution.

The paper was published the 5th of October of 2016 at The New Englando Journal of Medicine.

Then, we invite you to read the article:

New details redress the biological relation between zika and Guillian Barre syndrome.

Virus Zika induces the production of antibodies against infections, which could also affect the myelin nerves that can trigger in Guillain Barré.

With the collaboration of scientific of 6 Colombian hospitals, the investigators of Johns Hopkins Medicine informed about the biological test that could be the most striking link between virus Zika infection and Guillain Barre syndrome.

Epidemiological data have close connection with between the rate of Zika virus infection and the emerge of Guillain Barre cases. The results obtained from the new study, published the past 5th of October, at The New England Journal of Medicine, reinforce the relation between inmunological and viral trials of Zika infection in a considerable number of people with Guillain Barre syndrome, researchers affirm.

Guillain Barre syndrome, is an uncommon disorder and paralyzing nervous system, that appears days or week after an infection cause by viruses or bacterias. The illness, called postinfectious immune disorder, occurs when the immunological system of the patient attacks the myelin layer that protects neurons. This causes constantly, muscular weakness, pain, sensory deficiencies and in very acute cases, paralysis.

This syndrome affects, approximately, 1 or 2 persons per 100,000 that have suffer infections. This is diagnosed through electrodiagnostic neurological tests that measure the conduction velocity and activity of nervous signals. Scientifics don´t know why this disease affects just only few people. “Since the beginning, the Zika eruption started in South America, my colombian colleagues contact me due to the increase of patients with neurological complications”, Dr. Carlos A. Pardo, Neurology and Pathology professor of the Medicine Faculty at Johns Hopkins University and expert in neuroimmune and infectious diseases, including Guillain Barre syndrome.

For the new investigation, the Dr. Pardo´s research team and colombian colleagues, designed strategies to evaluate patients with intuition of Zika derivatives neurological problems. In addition, he provided the required tools for the realisation of viral tests in blood, cerebrospinal fluid and urine samples in 68 individuals with Guillain Barre symptoms. The 68 patients evaluated in Colombia, in the first phase, 42 were selected to carry out viral and immunologic studies using organic fluids. Before starting with the evaluation, researchers determined that urine was the organic liquid more reliable to diagnose Zika infection in patients with Guillain Barre.

From the 42 patients mentioned before, 17 show positivity in urine test; 18 didn´t have indications of Zika virus in urine, but the show up immunologic traces of Zika infection when detecting the presence of antibodies, characteristic of the virus in its blood or cerebrospinal liquid. The majority of the participants where adults, 38 men and 30 women, with an average age of 47 years old. Most of the patients manifested 2 or more clinical symptoms of the Zika infection, among them: fever, headache, rash and conjunctivitis.

Scientifics affirm that approximately the half of the participants complained about neurological symptomes within the 4 days after Zika symptomes appeared; as they said, this is an unusual rapid answer if we compare it with those who presents Guillain Barre symptomes later on to other infections, such as influenza and herpesviruses.

The results revealed that most of the 46 patients in whom Guillain Barre was confirmed due to  electrodiagnostic neurological tests that have the divergence of the disorder identify as acute inflamatory demyelinating polyneuropathy. This kind of  Guillain Barre destroys the myelin, a group  of protective cells that separate the surface of the nervous fibers just as the plastic covering overlies a copper wire.

According to Dr. Pardo, is considerated that this investigation is the biggest of its kind that has documented the rol of Zika infection on the increase of the rates of Guillain Barre. Dr. Pardo announces that, eventhough the investigation has demonstrate the biological and viral connection between Zika infection and Guillain Barre syndrome, hasn´t revealed which are those biological mechanisms that make Zika start its immune attack against the nerve.

The group of investigators, continue collecting clinical details and tests of patients in colombian hospitals, but the work is restricted due to the low availability of resources, still more by the outbreak of Zika in South America.

The colombian researchers that participated in this investigation, were: Beatriz Parra, Andres F. Zea-Vera y Lydia Osorio, Universidad del Valle in Cali; Jairo Lizarazo, Hospital Universitario Erasmo Meoz, Universidad de Pamplona in Cucuta; Jorge Jimenez y Reydmar López-Gonzalez, Universidad de Antioquia and Neuro.Clínica in Medellín; Guillermo Gonzalez-Manrique and Cindy Beltrán Universidad Surcolombiana, Hospital Universitario de Neiva; José Vargas, Karen H. Rizcala and María Morales, Clínica La Misericordia Internacional, Universidad Libre de Colombia in Barranquilla; Jorge Angarita, Clínica Medilased in Neiva; Gonzalo Zuñiga, Universidad del Valle, Hospital Universitario del Valle in Cali; Oscar Pacheco and Martha Ospina Martínez, Instituto Nacional de Salud in Bogotá. Other investigatoprs in Johns Hopkins including Anupama Kumar, David Cornblath, Laura S. Muñoz and Paula Barrera of Medicine Faculty at Johns Hopkins University.

The Neuroimmunology study was financed by Bart McLean fund, Project Restore of Johns Hopkins, VIREM, Virology Laboratory fund and the Microbology Department of Universidad del Valle.