Periventricular leukomalacia

Death of OL and subsequent myelin loss has been reported in a variety of myelin disorders including, multiple sclerosis (MS), X-adrenoleukodystrophy (X-ALD), adrenomyeloneu-ropathy (AMN), vascular dementia, periventricular leukomalacia (PVL), hypoxia, and ischemia. Several factors that might be associated with OL death in these pathophysiological concU-dons are discussed below. 

Rezaie, P. Dean, A. (2002). Periventricular leukomalacia, inflammation and white matter lesions within the developing nervous system. Neuropathol. 22 106—132. 

Periventricular leukomalacia has been reported after prenatal metamfetamine exposure [26 ]. 

The authors thought that this patient had no risk factors for periventricular leukomalacia, except for prematurity. They also thought that the cranial ultrasound results at weeks 1 and 6 were consistent with a history of metamfetamine exposure at 3 days before birth. They postulated that metamfetamine had caused cerebral ischemia and subsequent destruction of white matter and cyst formation 6 weeks later. However, they acknowledged that other factors could have contributed to the pathophysiology, including contamination of metamfetamine. 

Murphy CR, Bell EF, Sato Y, Klein JM. Periventricular leukomalacia and prenatal methamphetamine exposure a case report. Am J Perinatal 2007 24(2) 123-6. 

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