Magnetic resonance imaging of bilateral mesial temporal sclerosis in chronic kernicterus.

Kernicterus is an encephalopathy resulting from the cerebral deposition of unconjugated bilirubin in the neonatal period. We report a case of kernicterus where MRI demonstrated bilateral symmetric high signal intensity and volume loss in the hippocampus in addition to globus pallidus and subthalamic nucleus hyperintensity onT2-weighted images. The authors believe that hippocampal sclerosis, plays a role in adding specificity to the imaging diagnosis of kernicterus.