Neurology for the Non-neurologist

Abstract

The purpose of the nervous system is to interact with the environment to promote survival and reproduction. Thus, the nervous system must receive sensory inputs, the central nervous system (CNS) must “process” these inputs as well as internal signals and must respond via appropriate outputs many of them related to muscle movement. CNS “processing” includes such complicated phenomena as consciousness, emotion, and memory. The complexity of the nervous system is immense, a fact demonstrated by the expanding population of scientists involved in its study. The annual meeting of the Society of Neuroscience, basic scientists involved in the study of the nervous system, regularly attracts over 30,000 attendees. More clinically oriented neurology research meetings attract thousands of neurologists, physicians who care for patients with diseases of the nervous system. Since the focus in this chapter is neurological disease, rather than normal neurological function, there is not much basic neuroscience here, but the basis of all neurology is neuroscience, and the distinction between the two fields is somewhat artificial.