Perinatal Encephalopathies Caused by Maternal Diseases during Pregnancy

Abstract

The most important perinatal encephalopathies, which are caused by diseases of the mother during pregnancy, comprise brain damage due to malnourishment and some inherited metabolic diseases, dysthyroidism and diabetes, infectious diseases, hypoxic circulatory disturbances and kernicterus. Besides the brain alterations directly caused by these conditions, changes of a secondary nature are discussed. These are mainly due to curtailed or perverted maturational and late developmental processes. The end-result thus will be a complex of primary and secondary changes and the type and distribution of alterations are dependent not only upon the nature of the harmful factor but also on the time of its operation.

Magnetic resonance imaging of bilirubin encephalopathy: Current limitations and future promise

“…As noted above, in infants who later show CBE, early MR images often demonstrate prominent, symmetric high T1-signal in the globus pallidus and subthalamic nucleus, and less so in the hippocampus and the dentate nucleus of the cerebellum. These T1 findings are not related to hemorrhage but potentially reflect i) bilirubin-induced microglial activation as recently described in vitro 22,23 and observed in animal models of kernicterus, 24,25 although the neuropathology of kernicterus in human neonates provide conflicting evidence in this regard; 4,26 or ii) calcium granules scattered within damaged neurons. 4 …”