FEW physicians have been more honored by eponyms than Jules Dejerine (1849 to 1917), the French neurologist.1-3 Among the diseases that bear his name are facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (Landouzy-Dejerine), hypertrophic interstitial neuritis (Dejerine-Sottas), olivopontocerebellar atrophy (Dejerine-Thomas), and the thalamic syndrome (Dejerine-Roussy). His American wife, Augusta Klumpke, was also a talented neurologist whose name is now associated with lower brachial plexus palsy.4
Beginning in 1903, Dejerine and his associates discovered and studied the clinical and pathological features of the thalamic syndrome.5-7 Little has been added to their thorough presentations. Twenty years after Dejerine's initial paper on the subject, Foix, Masson, and Hillemand demonstrated the most common cause of the syndrome—occlusion of the thalamogeniculate branches of the posterior cerebral artery.8-10
The most distressing feature of the thalamic syndrome is the intense pain, which may be related to release of the thalamus from cortical inhibition.10 As Dejerine