Keywords
infecciones virales del ojo
encefalitis viral
encefalitis por varicela zóster
crisis convulsivas focales
How to Cite
Abstract
A painful red eye and seizures are frequent symptoms for consultations to the emergency room related to infectious and non-infectious diseases. As an infectious etiological agent, Varicella Zoster virus manifest as diseases with the aforementioned symptoms related to ocular and central nervous system diseases; however, each symptom usually corresponds to isolated pathologies, being infrequent the concomitance of both symptoms in the spectrum of pathologies from keratitis to herpetic encephalitis. This review presents the case of a 66-year-old woman who was admitted with a painful red eye, then diagnosed whit herpetic keratitis, and who later presents a first focal seizure episode; with this, herpetic encephalitis is suspected due to clinical relationship and, after paraclinical studies, the diagnosis of encephalitis due to varicella zoster virus is confirmed. It is highlighted from this clinical case that a high diagnostic suspicion of herpetic encephalitis despite an infrequent clinical presentation and without a direct causal relationship described so far in the literature with herpetic keratitis, led to an adequate diagnosis.
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