PEDIATRICS Vol. 107 No. 1 January 2001, p. e9

ELECTRONIC ARTICLE:
Central Nervous System and Renal Vasculitis Associated With Primary Varicella Infection in a Child

Received May 31, 2000; accepted Aug 1, 2000.

June M. Caruso^*, Glenn A. Tung, and William D. Brown^§

From the ^* Department of Neurology, Childrens National Medical Center, Washington, DC;  Division of Neuroradiology, Department of Diagnostic Imaging, Hasbro Children's Hospital and Rhode Island Hospital, and Department of Diagnostic Imaging, Brown University School of Medicine, Providence, Rhode Island; and the ^§ Division of Pediatric Neurology, Departments of Pediatrics and Neurology, Hasbro Children's Hospital and Rhode Island Hospital, and Department of Pediatrics and Clinical Neurosciences, Brown University School of Medicine, Providence, Rhode Island.

A 7-year-old girl with primary varicella presented with encephalopathy and focal neurologic deficits 10 days after her first skin lesions appeared. She was discovered to have bilateral wedge-shaped renal infarctions, and ischemic lesions in the conus medullaris, cerebral cortex, and deep gray matter consistent with a medium and large vessel arteritis on magnetic resonance imaging. This complication has never before been reported in an immunocompetent child with primary varicella infection, and it represents a rare but serious complication of childhood chickenpox.

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