DETROIT — A 58-year-old woman hospitalized in the Henry Ford Health System who has the new coronavirus developed a rare complication: encephalitis.
In a case report published online Tuesday in the journal Radiology, a team of doctors say the woman tested positive for the coronavirus, but also developed a case of acute necrotizing encephalitis, or ANE, a central nervous infection that mostly afflicts young children.
It is believed to be the first published case linking COVID-19 and acute necrotizing encephalitis. The rare and serious brain disease can develop in people who have a viral infection, and causes lesions to form in the brain, tissue death and symptoms such as seizures, drowsiness, confusion and coma.
The woman, who was identified as an airline worker, had several days of fever, cough and muscle aches, and was taken by ambulance March 19 to a Henry Ford emergency room, said Dr. Elissa Fory, a Henry Ford neurologist.
The patient also showed signs of confusion, lethargy and disorientation. A flu test turned up negative but a rapid COVID-19 test, developed in-house by Henry Ford’s clinical microbiology lab, confirmed she had the coronavirus, Fory said.
When the woman remained lethargic, doctors ordered repeat CT and MRI scans, which revealed abnormal lesions in both thalami and temporal lobes, parts of the brain that control consciousness, sensation and memory function. These scans confirmed doctors’ early suspicions.
“The team had suspected encephalitis at the outset, but then back-to-back CT and MRI scans made the diagnosis,” Fory said in a news release.
“This is significant for all providers to be aware of and looking out for in patients who present with an altered level of consciousness. We need to be thinking of how we’re going to incorporate patients with severe neurological disease into our treatment paradigm. This complication is as devastating as severe lung disease.”
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