October 7, 2019
Scientists funded by the EU Horizon 2020 grant and the ZikaPLAN-supported IGOS-Zika project have developed a globally applicable guideline for the diagnosis and management of Guillain–Barré syndrome(GBS) as a tool for clinicians. Their paper the "Diagnosis and management of Guillain-Barré syndrome in ten steps"was published in the high-impact journal ‘Nature Reviews Neurology’ on September 20, 2019
GBS is a rare, but potentially fatal, immune-mediated disease of the peripheral nerves and nerve roots. As it is usually triggered by infections, the incidence can suddenly and dramatically increase, and this was the case during the recent Zika virus epidemic in Latin America and the Caribbean. Diagnosis and management of GBS can be complicated as the clinical presentation and disease course are heterogeneous, and, previously, no international clinical guidelines for diagnosis and management existed.
To accommodate this unmet need and to support clinicians, especially during new incidences of GBS, the authors developed a globally-applicable, simple and practical clinical guideline for GBS.
The guideline is based on current literature and international expert consensus, presenting a 10-step approach to facilitate use in clinical practice. These 10 steps cover the most important aspects of diagnosis, treatment, monitoring, prognosis and long-term management. Furthermore, an overview of diagnostic criteria, clinical variants and differential diagnoses of GBS are provided in the manuscript. These are helpful resources for busy clinicians that can be printed and used at the bedside. To complement the paper, an easy-to-access, web-based resource is being developed.
This research was conducted by members of the ZikaPLAN working group 2: the Neurological Manifestations of Zika, combined with additional collaborators from the ZikaPLAN-supported International GBS Outcome Study-Zika (IGOS-Zika) network. The ZikaPLAN network as a whole greatly facilitated this initiative by helping identify the need for the project and by bringing together the leading international experts in GBS.
Prof.dr. Bart C. Jacobs, lead author of the international team of researchers from ZikaPLAN and IGOS-Zika behind the guidelines
Authors: Sonja Leonhard, Melissa Mandarakas, Francisco de Assis Aquino Gondim, Kathleen Bateman, Maria Lúcia Ferreira, David Cornblath, Pieter van Doorn, Mario Dourado, Richard Hughes, Badrul Islam, S Kusunoki, Carlos Pardo, Ricardo Reisin, Jim Sejvar, Nortina Shahrizaila, Cristiane Soares, Thirugnanam Umapathi, Yuzhong Wang, Eppie Yiu, Hugh Willison, and Bart Jacobs