Artikel
Neurodevelopmental Disorders in a Case of Morphine Addiction
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Veröffentlicht: | 11. September 2012 |
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Gliederung
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Objective: To describe the neuropathological findings in a case of morphine addiction.
Materials and Methods: In the Pathology Department of the “Fray Bernardino Álvarez” Psychiatric Hospital, there are 410 autopsy cases. We selected the case of a 64-year-old male with a record of 35-year addiction to morphine, auditory and visual hallucinations, and dellusions of reference. We reviewed the medical history and the autopsy material. The tissues were formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded, cut into 5–7μm slices, and stained with hematoxylin-eosin and argentaffin techniques in order to perform photonic microscopy.
Results: Macroscopically, the brain had a congestive appearance, with gyri flattening and sulci effacement. The histopathological study revealed microinfarctions in caudate nuclei; putamen; and frontal, temporal and cerebellar cortex; and a thrombus in the medulla oblongata. Moreover, several cortical regions showed spongiosis, with increasing of the perivascular and pericellular spaces, gliosis, chromatolysis, neuronophagia, vacuolated neurons, neuronal depopulation, and axons in different directions, some of which were bifurcated.
Conclusions: The microscopic features confirmed the diagnosis of a neurodevelopmental disorder (cortical dysplasia) with the presence of severe vascular alterations.