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Abstract Details

Small Pontine Tegmental Infarct Presenting as Ipsilateral Sixth and Seventh Nerve Palsies, Ipsilateral INO and Vertical Gaze Restriction
Cerebrovascular Disease and Interventional Neurology
Cerebrovascular Disease and Interventional Neurology Posters (7:00 AM-5:00 PM)
246
We describe a novel phenomenology and its mechanistic underpinning, a combination of ipsilateral sixth and seventh nerve palsies, ipsilateral INO and vertical gaze restriction from a small pontine tegmental infarct.

A number of syndromes have been reported with small pontine tegmental infarcts including, among others, internuclear ophthalmoplegia (INO), one and a half syndrome (and its derivatives), and isolated sixth and seventh nerve palsies. To our knowledge, the combination of ipsilateral sixth and seventh nerve palsies, ipsilateral INO and vertical gaze restriction has not been reported. 

Case Report:
A 51-year-old woman with hypertension, diabetes and a remote left thalamic hemorrhage awoke with horizontal diplopia and right facial droop. Neurologic examination showed no horizontal movement in her right eye, bilateral vertical gaze restriction, and a right lower motor neuron facial paresis. Brain MRI showed a small focus of diffusion restriction in the right pontine tegmentum at the level of the sixth and seventh nuclei and medial longitudinal fasciculus (MLF). FLAIR sequences demonstrated extensive small vessel disease. Putative mechanism of the infarct was small vessel disease.
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Pontine tegmental infarcts can manifest in INO, one and a half syndrome and its derivatives (i.e., “eight and a half,” “nine,” “thirteen and a half,” and fifteen and a half” syndromes), and isolated sixth or seventh nerve palsies. Our patient is unique in that she presented with right sixth and seventh nerve fascicular lesions, a right MLF lesion, and bilateral vertical gaze restriction. The latter is very unusual in pontine lesions. It is hypothesized that a paramedian pontine tract lesion, interrupting the cerebellar feedback to the vertical neural integrator in the nucleus of Cajal, can result in strong drift away from eccentric vertical position. A mesencephalic lesion affecting the vertical burst generators, below the resolution of the MRI, cannot be excluded.
Authors/Disclosures
Eman Alnosair, MD (University of Hospitals)
PRESENTER
Dr. Alnosair has nothing to disclose.
Michael A. De Georgia, MD (University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center) Dr. De Georgia has nothing to disclose.
Aasef Shaikh, MD Dr. Shaikh has received personal compensation in the range of $10,000-$49,999 for serving on a Speakers Bureau for Acorda.