Early Guillain-Barré syndrome in coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19): a case report from an Italian COVID-hospital

Ottaviani, Donatella; Boso, Federica; Tranquillini, Enzo; Gapeni, Ilaria; Pedrotti, Giovanni; Cozzio, Susanna; Guarrera, Giovanni M; Giometto, Bruno

Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS) is an acute polyradiculoneuropathy associated with dysimmune processes, often related to a previous infectious exposure. During Italian severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 outbreak, a woman presented with a rapidly progressive flaccid paralysis with unilateral facial neuropathy after a few days of mild respiratory symptoms. Coronavirus was detected by nasopharyngeal swab, but there was no evidence of its presence in her cerebrospinal fluid, which confirmed the typical albumin-cytological dissociation of GBS, along with consistent neurophysiological data. Despite immunoglobulin infusions and intensive supportive care, her clinical picture worsened simultaneously both from the respiratory and neurological point of view, as if reflecting different aspects of the same systemic inflammatory response. Similar early complications have already been observed in patients with para-infectious GBS related to Zika virus, but pathological mechanisms have yet to be established.