Much attention has been directed recently to the role of vitamin deficiency in the production of alcoholic polyneuritis,1 and there have been enthusiastic reports of the therapeutic value of the administration of vitamins. Most of these articles have dealt chiefly with the form of alcoholic polyneuritis not accompanied by mental changes. Polyneuritis and mental changes (Korsakoff's syndrome) associated with chronic alcoholism are usually considered to constitute a disease in which the prognosis is extremely poor, and with few exceptions2 the reports in the literature have dealt with the clinical and pathologic observations3 in cases in which the outcome was fatal. We thought it would be of value, therefore, to analyze the clinical records of a series of patients with this condition in an attempt to determine the mortality rate, the final clinical status of those who survived and the clinical factors of importance in regard to the