Pediatric Acute-onset Neuropsychiatric Syndrome (PANS) is a clinical diagnosis given to children who have a dramatic sometimes overnight onset of neuropsychiatric symptoms including obsessions/compulsions or food restriction. They are often diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) or an eating disorder, but the sudden onset of symptoms separates PANS from these other disorders. In addition, they may have symptoms of depression, irritability, anxiety, and have difficulty with schoolwork. The cause of PANS is unknown in most cases but is thought to be triggered by infections, metabolic disturbances, and other inflammatory reactions.
Like PANS, children with Pediatric Autoimmune Neuropsychiatric Disorder Associated with Streptococcal Infections (PANDAS) have an acute onset within 2 to 3 days of neuropsychiatric symptoms, specifically OCD or tics (involuntary, purposeless movements). However, PANDAS patients test positive for a recent streptococcal infection, such as strep throat, peri-anal strep or scarlet fever. Like PANS patients, they also may suffer from uncontrollable emotions, irritability, anxiety and loss of academic ability and handwriting skills. Although PANDAS was identified as a medical syndrome more than a decade before PANS, it has been classified as a subset of PANS. To date, PANDAS is the only known subset of PANS, but we may discover more causes in the future.
This is an interesting new discovery in microbiology. What are your thoughts on this topic? What other diseases seem to be caused by an autoimmune response due to a microbial infection?
PANS | PANS: Pediatric Acute-onset Neuropsychiatric Syndrome. Https://med.stanford.edu/pans.html, n.d. Web. 15 May 2017. https://med.stanford.edu/pans.html (Links to an external site.).
Weintraub, Pamela. “Hidden Invaders.” Discover Magazine. Discover Magazine, 29 Mar. 2017. Web. 15 May 2017. http://discovermagazine.com/2017/april-2017/hidden-invaders.html”.
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