Postencephalitic Parkinsonism in a Patient with Mumps Infection: A Case Report

In 1917, Von Economo described a disease named "Encephalitis Lethargica" which affected a large number of patients across the world in an epidemic between 1916 and 1927. It's spread paralleled with the spread of the pandemic influenza, but Von Economo and the contemporary authors did not believe it to be a post-influenzal sequela. Now parkinsonism is a well-known complication of acute infectious encephalitis. There are many potential infectious causes of parkinsonism reported in literature. In India, postencephalitic parkinsonism is commonly due to Japanese Encephalitis. Neurologic manifestations reported in Mumps include meningitis, encephalitis, deafness, facial neuritis, cerebellar ataxia, hydrocephalus, transverse myelitis and polyradiculitis. We describe a case of young girl who had Mumps parotitis and encephalitis and then subsequently developed parkinsonism as a sequela. Mumps was confirmed by positive serology and basal ganglia lesions were demonstrated by magnetic resonance imaging of the brain. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first case of postencephalitic parkinsonism following Mumps infection from India.