Encephalopathy overview

Editor-In-Chief: C. Michael Gibson, M.S., M.D. [1] ; Associate Editor(s)-in-Chief: Aditya Govindavarjhulla, M.B.B.S. [2]

Overview

Encephalopathy literally means disease of the brain. It is a brain malfunction in the face of systemic metabolic derangements due to cardiopulmonary, mitochondrial, renal, hepatic or endocrine disease. In medical jargon it can refer to a wide variety of degenerative brain disorders with very different etiologies, prognoses and implications. For example, prion diseases, all of which causetransmissible spongiform encephalopathies, are nearly always fatal and have an infectious origin, but other encephalopathies are reversible and can be caused by deficiency, toxins, and several other causes.