Creutzfeldt-Jakob is a rare, primary neurological disease, from the group of subacute progressive neurodegenerative diseases, with an evolution toward severe dementia and death in about six months to one year from the onset of the clinical symptoms. The onset is usually characterized by fast progressive dementia causing memory loss, personality changes or hallucinations, followed by neurological signs and symptoms including speech impairment, myoclonus, at ataxia, seizures, and so on. We present here the case of a 26 years old patient, known as a drug abuser since she was 14 years-old (cannabis, ketamine, heroin, methadone, amphetamine, legal highs), with psychiatric symptoms since she was 22 (psychotic and depressive elements), who was admitted for poly-drug abuse. While admitted in a toxicology ward she entered suddenly in a coma with significant opisthotonus, with an unfavorable course and death at one month and a half after the initial admission. During the hospital stay was suspected a Creutzfeltd-Jakob disease, that was confirmed during the autopsy. The psychiatric pathology was reconstructed after performing the forensic autopsy.

The particularity of this case is the masking of the initial psychiatric symptoms of the Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease by drug-related psychiatric symptoms, causing a delayed diagnosis and a particular course of the disease.

Acknowledgment: This work was possible with the financial support of the Sectoral Operational Programme for Human Resources Development 2007-2013, co-financed by the European Social Fund, under the project number POSDRU/159/1.5/S/137390.