Jan Van den Stock *, Beatrice de Gelder , François-Laurent De Winter , Koen Van Laere d and Mathieu Vandenbulcke a Brain and Emotion Laboratory Leuven (BELL), Division of Psychiatry, Department of Neurosciences, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium Tilburg University, Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience Laboratory, Tilburg, The Netherlands Athinoula A. Martinos Centre for Biomedical Imaging, Massachuset...

A Caucasian girl developed slowly progressive sensory neural deafness and bulbar and spinal muscle weakness typical of the Vialetto-Van Laere syndrome. As the condition progressed the major disabilities became dysphagia, respiratory muscle weakness and postural hypotension. Treatment with gastrostomy feedings, oxygen and fludrocortisone acetate produced worthwhile functional improvement.

A female with the Brown-Vialetto-Van Laere syndrome is described. The patient's father, a paternal uncle, and possibly a paternal first cousin had neurosensory deafness and a paternal aunt had clinical symptoms indicative of the syndrome. This family raises the possibility that the disorder is genetically heterogeneous with autosomal recessive and autosomal dominant forms. Alternatively, it cou...

We report the first Brazilian family with Brown-Vialetto-van Laere syndrome. The presence of consanguineous marriages and illness affecting three sisters and one niece support an autosomal recessive transmission. The age at onset of the illness ranged from 12 to 20 years old. The time interval between hearing loss and involvement of other cranial nerves varied from 3 to 12 years. MRI demonstrat...

Riboflavin transporter deficiency (formerly known as Brown-Vialetto-Van Laere [BVVL] or Fazio-Londe syndrome) is a neurodegenerative disorder characterized by progressive bulbar palsy with sensorineural deafness or bulbar hereditary neuropathy. It is caused by mutations in the riboflavin transporter genes SLC52A2 (RFVT2) or SLC52A3 (RFVT3). It is a rare syndrome with approximately 70 cases repo...

We describe a 14-year-old female patient with progressive ponto-bulbar palsy and deafness. The first symptom was present at the age of 9 as a difficulty in walking and then she was stable with mild clumsy walking till 14 year-old. It was noticed that she had rapidly progression gait disorder, hearing loss, difficulty in swallowing and speaking in a period of 2.5 months. Clinically, there were b...

Brown-Vialetto-Van Laere syndrome is a rare neurological disorder with a variable age at onset and clinical course. The key features are progressive ponto-bulbar palsy and bilateral sensorineural deafness. A complex neurological phenotype with a mixed picture of upper and lower motor neuron involvement reminiscent of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis evolves with disease progression. We identified ...