Spinal Muscular Atrophy - Symptoms

Symptoms

The symptoms vary greatly depending on the SMA type involved, the stage of the disease and individual factors and commonly include:

  • Areflexia, particularly in extremities
  • Overall muscle weakness, poor muscle tone, limpness or a tendency to flop (the "floppy baby" syndrome)
  • Difficulty achieving developmental milestones, difficulty sitting/standing/walking
  • In infants: adopting of a frog-leg position when sitting (hips abducted and knees flexed)
  • Loss of strength of the pulmonary muscles: weak cough, weak cry (infants), accumulation of secretions in the lungs or throat, respiratory distress
  • Bell-shaped torso (caused by using only abdominal muscles for respiration)
  • Clenched fists with sweaty hands
  • Head often tilted to one side, even when lying down
  • Fasciculations (twitching) of the tongue
  • Difficulty sucking or swallowing, poor feeding
  • Arthrogryposis (multiple congenital contractures)
  • Weight lower than normal

Read more about this topic:  Spinal Muscular Atrophy

Famous quotes containing the word symptoms:

    For anyone addicted to reading commonplace books ... finding a good new one is much like enduring a familiar recurrence of malaria, with fever, fits of shaking, strange dreams. Unlike a truly paludismic ordeal, however, the symptoms felt while savoring a collection of one man’s pet quotations are voluptuously enjoyable ...
    M.F.K. Fisher (1908–1992)

    Not being a K.N. [Know-Nothing] I am left as a sort of waif on the political sea with symptoms of a mild sort towards Black Republicanism.
    Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)

    In retirement, only money and symptoms are consequential.
    Mason Cooley (b. 1927)