Neurologic manifestation and classification of borreliosis

The neurologic symptoms of borreliosis can be classified to give distinct clinical pictures. The exact clinical characterisation allows an unambiguous and applicable classification of the different neurologic manifestations to be made. Due to high background seroprevalence of anti-Borrelia antibodies this classification is crucial for diagnosis. The most frequent neurologic manifestation is meningopolyradiculitis. It shows a typical pattern of symptoms, yet for differential diagnosis the crucial symptoms are the severe pains and the paresis of cranial nerves. In up to 10% of these patients no specific intrathecal antibody production was identified due to the time factor. Intrathecal antibody production cannot therefore be considered as the exclusive criterium for neuroborreliosis.