Facts About Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease: CDC-OC
Article title: Facts About Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease: CDC-OC
Conditions: Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease
Source: CDC-OC
Facts About Creutzfeldt-Jakob
Disease
November 14, 1997
Media Relations
Division
(404) 639-3286
- Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD) is a progressive neurological
disorder which belongs to a group of degenerative neurologic diseases
known as subacute spongiform encephalopathies.
- Clinical features of CJD include a neurological presentation, with
dementia, and a progressive cerebellar syndrome including ataxia, gait,
and speech abnormalities. In most patients, these symptoms are followed
by involuntary movements and the appearance of a typical diagnostic
electroencephalogram tracing.
- From 10 to 15 percent of CJD cases are inherited, but cases have
been associated with the use of contaminated corneal transplants,
electrode implants, dura mater grafts, and receipt of human growth
hormone.
- CJD occurs worldwide at a rate of about 1 case per million
population per year.
- The disease is found most frequently in patients 55-65 years of age,
but cases can occur in persons older than 90 years and younger than 55
years of age.
- In more than 85 percent of cases, the duration of CJD is less than 1
year (median: 4 months) after onset of symptoms.
- CDC monitors the occurrence of CJD in the United States through
periodic reviews of national mortality data.
- On the basis of mortality surveillance from 1979 to 1994, the annual
incidence of CJD remained stable at approximately 1 case per million
persons in the United States.
- In the United States, CJD deaths among persons younger than 30 years
of age are extremely rare (fewer than 5 deaths per billion per year).
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