Harvey Cushingʼs Guillain-Barré Syndrome: An Historical Diagnosis

Harvey Cushing developed an illness in the last months of World War I that made it impossible for him to operate and forced him to bed for over a month. The features of Cushing's malady included symmetrical weakness, numbness, and paresthesias of the hands and feet, areflexia, bilateral facial paresis, diplopia, and fever. Neither Cushing nor his physicians were able to make a diagnosis. John Fulton, Cushing's biographer, misdiagnosed the condition as a "vascular polyneuritis," and Harry Zimmerman, who performed Cushing's autopsy, incorrectly attributed his symptoms to occlusion of the abdominal aorta. Based on extensive notes in Cushing's war diary describing the illness, it is readily recognized today as Guillain-Barré syndrome.