26 Syphilitic Nervous Affections, London, 1874, p. 80.
27 Archiv f. Psychiatrie, vii. p. 241.
Although syphilis is prone to attack the nervous system many years after infection, it would be a fatal mistake to suppose that nervous disease may not rapidly follow the chancre. What is the minimum possible intermediate period we do not know, but it is certainly very brief, as is shown by the following cases of this so-called precocious nervous syphilis. Alfrik Ljunggrén of Stockholm reports28 the case of H. R——, who had a rapidly-healed chancre in March, followed in May of the same year by a severe headache, mental confusion, and giddiness. Early in July H. R—— had an epileptic attack, but was finally cured by active antisyphilitic treatment. Although the history is not explicit, the nervous symptoms appear to have preceded the development of distinct secondaries other than rheumatic pains.
28 Archiv f. Dermatol. u. Syphilis, 1870, ii. p. 155.
Davaine is said29 to have seen paralysis of the portio dura “a month after the first symptoms of constitutional syphilis.” E. Leyden30 found advanced specific degeneration of the cerebral arteries in a man who had contracted syphilis one year previously. R. W. Taylor details a case in which epilepsy occurred five months after the infection.31 In the case of M. X——, reported by Ad. Schwarz,32 headache came on the fortieth day after the appearance of the primary sore, and a hemiplegia upon the forty-sixth day. S. L——33 had a paralytic stroke without prodromes six months after the chancre. A. P. L——34 had an apoplectic attack seven months after the chancre; A. S——, one five months after her chancre. In a case which recently occurred in the practice of A. Sydney Roberts of this city the chancre appeared after a period of incubation of twenty-six days, and two months and eight days subsequent to this came the first fit; eight days after the first the second convulsion occurred, with a distinct aura, which preceded by some minutes the unconsciousness. An interesting observation in this connection is that of Ern. Gaucher35 of a spinal syphilis occurring six months after the appearance of a chancre.
29 Buzzard, Syphilitic Nervous Affections, London, 1874.
30 Zeitschrift f. klin. Med., Bd. v. 165.
31 Journ. Nervous and Mental Dis., 1876, p. 38.
32 De l'Hémiplegia syphilitique Prêcoce, Inaug. Diss., Paris, 1880.
33 Ibid.