A few questions!
 

Ok. The past few days I have been reading up on this PN business and trying to get my head (concentration permitting) around causes/diagnoses - of which there are many, I realise!

So just a couple of questions today!

1). Are muscle twitches (fasciculations) associated with:

a). sensory neuropathy alone
b). muscular neuropathy alone
c). autonomic neuropathy
d). a combination and if so, of which ones

So in other words, can you for example have fasciculations if you have just sensory neuropathy?

2). Is patchy sensory neuropathy associated with any particular cause?

3). If one is having symptoms in addition to PN such as extreme gut sequelae, fatigue, arthralgias, myalgias, does that mean something autonomic may be happening?

4). Are there time lines between the manifestation of some symptoms eg. sensory and eg. when muscle involvement may occur.

5). Apart from Guillain-Barre syndrome where progression of symptoms is rapid, how long in most PN's 'til you know if you are getting better or worse - ie. before treatment is instituted? Or is it always downhill unless it is an hysterical PN - which may be shortterm?

I do realise that everyone's case is different but are there any patterns?

More questions later!!:D

Gees Megan...
 

Your right on the money with your questions. I also have bodywide small fibre PN. I started experiencing muscle twitching about 18 months into it. It may have been my fault but. I have this foot massage shiatsu machine that I would stand on,and it has these rolling balls. I was probably overusing it cause one day my foot started twitching,and the twitching just sort of spread.

Massaging my feet could also set off massive autonomic symptoms in me, in the beginning. I also have had gastro issues which have improved too. I always had a cramp or tight feeling in my left calf, from the beginning.

Hope an expert pops in here for some better insight into this matter.

There are a lot of causes of muscular fasiculations--
 

--including neuropathy, of course, though if one experiences it within the context of neuropathy, it would mean that one had at least some motor involvement.

There are a number of people for whom cramping/fasiculation has been the only motor symptom they've experienced. Annoying, but much les debilitating than actual muscle weakness. Such people are usually described as having a sensorimotor neuropathy--the main affected system is mentioned first--and this is actually fairly common. Many of the conditions that can affect myelination--from autoimmune situations to toxins to nutritional deficiencies, can result in this pattern.

And, autonomic disruptions are common, though often subclinical, in any syndrome in which there is substantial small-fiber involvement. Again, one can have a neuropathy with predominantly small-fiber disruption, predominantly large-fiber disruption, or a mixed type. The permutations are many.

Patchy sensory disruption is a bit less common, but does occur. In fact, asymmetric sensory disruption does tend to cause one to lean towards certain diagnoses, especially vasculitic autoimmune conditions, a number of infectious conditions (Lyme, West Nile, Hepatitis C) and, unfortuantely, a number of blood cancers.

See:

http://www.neuro.wustl.edu/neuromusc...symmetric.html

Fasciculations and MRI
 

Thanks for your replies.

I know what you mean about fasciculations. I think everyone gets them from time to time like the twitching eyelid etc. BUT these ones I am talking about have risen in both frequency and distribution enormously since the PN onset. Sometimes they are like an orchestra - I'm lying in bed or sitting in a chair and it's the right calf then the left thigh followed by the buttocks and then an ear!!! Quite funny really if it wasn't a bit of a worry!

Well I had my brain MRI last night and although I am usually so claustrophobic I managed to get through without a panic attack - so very pleased with myself! Listened to some ABBA music which beat in perfect time to the banging in the MRI which was also quite amusing at times!

Cool link. Fascinating, all the possible connections.

I am basically a twitching machine, especially from the knees down. I always figured it was my fibromyalgia, which it still could be, but good to know about other causes.

fanfaire
:cool:

I have some pretty serious muscle twitching too....even tho I have been pain free for EIGHT DAYS NOW (omg I thought I would never say those words)...I do notice that I still have a little twitching going on. Who cares, Im pain free! But I get them all over, face, legs in various spots...arms occasionally...again, nothing i can't live with but certainly annoying!