2026 American Academy of Neurology Abstract Website

Francisco Caiza-Zambrano¹, Anabella Gomez², Ana Laura Blazquez³, Camila Aguirre⁴, Juliana Diaz⁵, Anabella Frances⁶, Cecilia Quarracino⁷, Florencia Sica⁸, Eugenia Conti⁵, Miguel Saucedo⁹, Valeria Lujan Salutto¹⁰, David Bajicoff¹⁰, Alejandro Rodriguez⁴, Gabriela Peretti¹¹, Lucas Martín Romano⁸, Gisela Zanga¹², Raul Melano³, Mauricio Benetti¹, Andrés Berardo⁶, Paula Landriscina⁴, José Crespo², Facundo Heredia¹, Paz Zuberbuhler², Cintia Marchesoni¹, Luciana León-Cejas¹, Ricardo Reisin¹
¹Department of Neurology, Hospital Británico de Buenos Aires, ²Department of Neurology, Hospital General de Agudos Dr. Teodoro Álvarez, ³Department of Neurology, Hospital Eva Perón de San Martín, ⁴Department of Neurology, Instituto de Neurociencias Buenos Aires, ⁵Department of Neurology, Hospital de Clínicas José de San Martín, ⁶Department of Neurology, Sanatorio Allende, ⁷Department of Neurology, Sanatorio de Los Arcos, ⁸Department of Neurology, Hospital Privado de Comunidad, ⁹Department of Neurology, Hospital San Francisco de Asís, ¹⁰Department of Neurology, Instituto de Investigaciones Médicas Dr Alfredo Lanari, ¹¹Department of Neurology, Hospital General de niños Ricardo Gutierrez, ¹²Department of Neurology, Hospital César Milstein

Objective:

To determine the mean diagnosis delay in patients with MG from Argentina.

Background:

Diagnosing myasthenia gravis (MG) can be challenging due to the variability in clinical presentation. Studies in developed countries have identified a diagnosis delay of more than a year in approximately 10% of patients. Data in Latin America is lacking.

Design/Methods:

A retrospective study was conducted in patients with MG who received treatment in twelve centers. Medical records were reviewed to attain sociodemographic data and disease characteristics. Diagnosis delay (time from symptom onset to diagnosis) was calculated.

Results:

172 patients were included. The majority were women (65.1%). The mean age at symptom onset was 43.3 years (SD 21.9), and ocular symptoms were the most frequent (70%) at disease onset. More than half (55.3%) were from the public health system. Neurology was consulted first by the 8.3% of patients.

Mean diagnosis delay was 422.6 (SD 771.5) days, and 24.3% of patients experienced diagnosis delay >1 year. Among patients with >1 year, 29.4% had initially received a different diagnosis and 35.2% were Myasthenia Gravis Foundation of America class III at the time of the diagnosis.

Diagnosis was faster in patients who first consulted a neurologist compared to those evaluated by other specialists (mean 116.5 days vs. 459.1 days; p=0.015). There were no differences between patients evaluated in the public or private health care system.

Conclusions:

Although the development of new therapies has advanced in recent years, further efforts are needed in medical education about the disease to improve the diagnosis of MG.