THE SYNDROME OF INTERNAL FRONTAL HYPEROSTOSIS : Report of Eight Cases

There is a syndrome occurring almost exclusively in females, whose pathognomonic sign is internal frontal hyperostosis, and which is generally accompanied by truncal obesity and frequently by facial hirsutism. Certain other metabolic and physiologic disturbances are more or less commonly observed. Considerable experimental, morphologic and pathophysiologic evidence now exists to point to the etiologic importance in this disease of dysfunction of the anterior lobe of the pituitary gland. Neurologic and mental sequelae, as a consequence of the presence of the hyperostoses, appear to be quite infrequent. In the series of cases here presented it was felt that the neuropsychiatric signs and symptoms were not to be attributed to the effect of the hyperostoses on the underlying brain tissue, but were the result of other factors, such as cerebral arteriosclerosis, hypertension, etc. A theory to account for the formation and localization of the hyperostoses has been advanced.