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The True Sign of Babinski

2001; American Medical Association; Volume: 125; Issue: 6 Linguagem: Inglês

10.5858/2001-125-723a-ttsob

1543-2165

Fidias E. Leon‐S, Luis J. Prada,

History of Medicine Studies

To the Editor.—We read with interest the paper written recently by Jay on the Sign of Babinski.1 We agree that Babinski did “his most famous communication on the reflex only 28 lines long.”1 However, we disagree with Jay on the correlation between this communication and the so-called Babinski sign; Joseph Babinski never called the up-going toe as such. He actually called the extensor plantar reflex “the great toe sign,” and what he called the Babinski sign was the failure of the platysma muscle to contract on the side of a hemiparesis.2 Unfortunately, the mistake remains up to recent times supported by some researchers, who increase the confusion by interexchanging the terms sign and reflex in the same paper. That is why we recommend maintaining the term Babinski sign as described originally and using Babinski reflex for “the great toe sign.”3 It should also be remembered that “the great toe sign,” or the Babinski reflex, does not mean a disturbance of the pyramidal tract itself, as usually thought, because this reflex could be present in patients with pure peripheral neuropathies, such as the Guillain-Barré syndrome, as well.4 We want to stress that heretofore we must give the appropriate credit and meaning to original descriptions in the medical sciences field to avoid more misunderstandings in this new century of evidence-based medicine.