Clinical and electrophysiological features of Guillain-Barré syndrome in Iran

We evaluated the clinical and electrophysiological characteristics of 121 consecutive patients admitted with Guillain-Barré syndrome (GBS) to a tertiary referral hospital in Tehran, Iran, from 1997 to 2007. The mean age of patients was 38.9 (standard deviation 19.7) years. The predominant subtype of GBS was the demyelinating form. Miller Fisher syndrome was present in 3.3% of patients. There was no significant seasonal clustering among the three subtypes, but axonal variants tend to occur in summer. In contrast with other subtypes, the majority of patients with acute motor-sensory axonal neuropathy (AMSAN) were female (72.3%). AMSAN patients also had significantly longer hospitalization time (p = 0.002) and intensive care unit (ICU) admission (p = 0.017), while none of the acute motor axonal neuropathy patients needed ICU admission. Involvement of cranial nerves and symmetry of signs were significantly detected in the demyelinating variant (p = 0.021 and p = 0.040, respectively). The overall mortality was 3.3%.