Quantitation of Meissner's corpuscles in hereditary neurologic disorders

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Abstract
The numbers of cholinesterase-positive Meissner corpuscles per unit area have been determined in thick horizontal sections of 168 specimens of skin from the distal pads of the small finger and great toe of affected persons and their normal relatives in kinships displaying familial neurologic disorders. The concentration of Meissner''s corpuscles in the toe and also in the finger was decreased in patients with chronic sensory loss (thought to be due to involvement of the primary sensory neuron) as a manifestation of Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease, Roussy-Levy syndrome, Dejerine-Scottas disease, hereditary sensory neuropathy, and, probably, spinocerebellar degenerations. The greatest decrease was in those persons with the greatest sensory loss. An unexpected finding was the decreased concentration of corpuscles in 2 patients with spastic paraplegia with mental retardation.