I do like to remind people that a lot of the sophisticated blood tests for autoantibodies to nerve and for certain hereditary neuromuscular conditions have only been developed in the last two-three decades; in 1980 thre were even more people labelled "idiopathic" (at least as a percentage of people with neurologic symptoms--it's a fair question as to whether the incidence of such symptoms has risen, given our diets and the toxins in our environments).

I had to laugh about the final sensory ganglioitis comment--Dr. Abhey Moghekar at Johns Hopkins, who has done a lot of research in that area and who I've corresponded with, did tell me at one point that it was a possible etiology in my case, but we did not yet have the imaging technology to discern the condition of the dorsal root ganglia and that confirmation of such a diagnosis awaited my autopsy. (Typical neurologist humor, which is to say not much of.)