I have been suffering with terrible muscles spasms for about 5 yrs. now. It started out in my feet and the past couple of months i've had muscle spasms in my hands (not as severe as the feet tho). Could this be dystonia? I've had x-rays, mri's, bloodwork, etc... and all were normal. I cut out aspartame in my diet, and there's plenty of potassium in my diet. Does extreme heat/cold (weather) have any effect to the spasms. My feet are always cold while my hands are hot and sweaty most of the time. I use to play soccer and I ran x-country. This is not genetic, no one else in family has this condition.
I would like to hear more about dystonia, hopefully this will help me. Thanks. Last night I had another "spasm" in my left foot. It felt like a bunch of rubber bands being stretched and it stayed like it for about 20 mins; it seemed my foot was going to be bent in half. All of my toes started to curl until the bones looked like it was going to break through the skin. Today my foot looks normal (no swelling) but it hurts like hell when I walk and along the side of my foot is numb, no feeling whatsoever.
Bernie, you mentioned something with your eyes. Well every now and then the nerves of my eyelids will "twitch" or it will feel heavy (like I need toothpicks to keep it opened). That will sometimes leave some pain there also.
As for your question of where I came up with dystonia, I use to work with sports medicine doctors and one of them mentioned it to me. I asked my family doctor and he had never heard of it before. I was curious about other people's experience with dystonia.
Thanks for your answers, its greatly appreciated. Dystonia is a neurological movement disorder in which sustained muscle contractions cause twisting and repetitive movements or abnormal postures. The disorder may be inherited or caused by other factors such as birth-related or other physical trauma, infection or reaction to drugs.
Primary dystonia is caused by a pathology of the central nervous system, likely originating in those parts of the brain concerned with motor function, such as the basal ganglia. The precise cause of primary dystonia is unknown. In many cases it probably involves some genetic predisposition towards the disorder combined with environmental conditions.
Secondary dystonia refers to dystonia brought on by some identified cause, usually involving brain damage, or by some unidentified cause such as chemical imbalance. Some cases of (particularly focal) dystonia are brought on after trauma, are induced by certain drugs (tardive dystonia), or may be the result of diseases of the nervous system such as Wilson's disease.
Symptoms vary according to the kind of dystonia involved. In all cases, dystonia tends to lead to abnormal posturing, particularly on movement. For many sufferers, pain due to muscle spasms is also a feature of the condition.
These are the most common dystonias and tend to be classified as follows:
Cervical dystonia (spasmodic torticollis). This affects the muscles of the neck, causing the head to rotate to one side, to pull down towards the chest, or back, or a combination of these postures.
Blepharospasm. This affects the muscles around the eyes. The sufferer experiences rapid blinking of the eyes or even their forced closure causing effective blindness.
Oculogyric crisis. An extreme and sustained (usually) upward deviation of the eyes often with convergence causing diplopia. It is frequently associated with backwards and lateral flexion of the neck and either widely opened mouth or jaw cletching. Frequently a result of antiemetics such as the neuroleptics (e.g. prochlorperazine) or metoclopramide.
Oromandibular dystonia. This affects the muscles of the jaw and tongue, causes distortions of the mouth and tongue.
Spasmodic dysphonia. This affects the muscles of the larynx, causing the voice to sound broken or reducing it to a whisper.
The combination of blepharospasmodic contractions and oromandibular dystonia is called Meige's syndrome.
Drugs, such as anticholinergics which act as an inhibitor of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine, may provide some relief. Clonazepam, an anti-seizure medicine, is also sometimes prescribed. However, for most sufferers their effects are limited. Botulinum toxin injections into affected muscles have proved quite successful in providing some relief for around 3-6 months, depending on the kind of dystonia. The injections have to be repeated and around 15% of recipients develop immunity to the toxin.
Surgery, such as the denervation of selected muscles, may also provide some relief. Recently, the procedure of deep brain stimulation has proved successful in a number of cases of severe generalised dystonia.
But I don't think it is dystonia for your case. It might be something else. If it affects you very much on your daily activities, please take care and seek medical advice. It is more cheaper for early treatment than late treatment you know? This is what stinks about Yahoo Answers. Look at Paragraph 3 of winner & the 1st paragraph just below begins "Secondary... It is a copy job, where the question is, "Does anyone have dystonia?" Proves one can't even suffer w/this crap and get any respect!! Report It
Secondary dystonia refers to dystonia brought on by some identified cause, usually involving brain damage, or by some unidentified cause such as chemical imbalance. Some cases of (particularly focal) dystonia are brought on after trauma, are induced by certain drugs (tardive dystonia), or may be the result of diseases of the nervous system such as Wilson's disease.
Drugs, such as anticholinergics which act as an inhibitor of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine, may provide some relief. Clonazepam, an anti-seizure medicine, is also sometimes prescribed. However, for most sufferers their effects are limited. Botulinum toxin injections into affected muscles have proved quite successful in providing some relief for around 3-6 months, depending on the kind of dystonia.
your doctor should recommend the best treatment for you I happen to have dystonia. From what you are describing, it doesn't sound like dystonia, yet I am not a doctor, and could not say for sure. I have dystonia as a result of Progressive Supranuclear Palsy (PSP). Also, it could be the result of 5-6 TIAs that show up on an MRI. Then again, the PSP itelf may be a result of the TIAs? B.T.W., PSP is one of about (5) Parkinsonisms, often referred to as Parkinsons Plus. Many of us are first diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease because they look so much alike symptomatically. However, in time, it will usually be clear that we do not usually respond to the medicine, and we begin to get worse much more quickly. Also, there will be an upward gaze of the eyes, and a pronounced loss of balance, etc.
The worst form of the dystonia that I have is in the toes of my right foot. They are so clenched downward that at times I can barely walk. It is hard enough for me to stay on my feet because of my loss of balance. The toes on my foot became so mangled whereby one of the toes is partially sitting on top of the next one, pushing that one onto the next one. I actually asked my podiatrist to remove three of my toenails because they were in the way! I've had Botox treatment 3 or 4 times for this. It is supposed to relieve it for up to 3 mos. For me, it worked pretty well the first time, but only for 3-4 weeks. And then it didn't work at all the next 2-3 times.
Although my insurance was actually paying the $3,000+ that it cost each time, I thought it wise to stop. I have just now been involved in accupuncture for this problem, along with relief from the cervical or neck dystonia I suffer from. To make a long story short, it does not seem to be helping. Some things work better for others, and not so good for you. I can definitely see the viability of both of those treatments.
As the gentleman above me described ones head/neck tilting to the side, and kind of craning around. Well that is me! I guess you could call me Ich (a) bod (is) Crane (ing). I just made that up! Do I get extra credit points, or just a good swift kick in the rear for that one?
Also my mouth and tongue have odd, distorted movements that fall into the same category, as dystonia. Very often, my face, especially around my forehead, feels like it is pulling or stretching like a large facial tic or spasm. It is all coupled with my mouth and tongue. And the worst part of it is that my eyes feel like they are stretching "wide open shut." That is to say I feel like I am getting tortured where they've used toothpicks or other clamps to force my eyes to stay open, but I can't really see too well! Along with my neck craning, I kind of look like the old caricatures of William F. Buckley (I don't know your age, but nonetheless, he was a conservative politician/pundit very well-known in the 60's-70's or thereabouts).
As I had said earlier the feet are the main concern because they get me places. It is kind of like a spasm. The word "spasm" is way too subjective a word. Every individual sees it in a very distinct manner. However, these words are all we have to work with! There are times that the toe spasm is much worse than others. It is not actually the toes spasming, but rather the fleshy (always wanted to use that word) area just below the toes. It seems to get worse as the day wears on, and I become increasingly tired. There are times when my toes feel quite relaxed, but those times seem to be rather short-lived.
I am kind of curious as to how you came up with the word
"dystonia" as the most likely cause for your problems? It is certainly not a household name! B.T.W., you mentioned your hands. The classic "writer's cramp" is synonymous with dystonia. It is, wouldn't you have just guess it, another one of my problems. I cannot write at all! If you gave me a phone number,for example, over the telephone (or anywhere, for that matter), I could not write it legibly even if I took my time and rewrote it 10 times. I know it seems hard to believe! There are some things I can still do reasonably well with my hands, and there are other things I cannot do at all. The typing that I'm doing now seems to be going along pretty well with my usual two finger style, except that my hands have such a "staccato" or herky-jerky movement to them that about every 3-4 words I will not strike the keys hard enough to make them register, and will have to go back constantly to insert or strike out letters.
Well I'm real tired now. I hope you've gotten some insight from my experience with dystonia. Again, I would say that it is probably not dystonia that you suffer with. But that would just be a hunch, at best. Well, this was good therapy for me. I had my very own captive audience to whine and complain to! Not too shabby! One more complaint is that my voice is almost totally gone. They say that is from dystonia too! Who knows? If you want to really get the correct answer, don't mess around with small-timers like us...............go to Yahoo Answers!
Well, I'm bushed, I'm gonna hit the sack, and get some shut-eye
Sat nite - In response to your Additions/Questions:
-The experience you are describing is more like an acute situation, where it suddenly comes on like gangbusters, and will last for 20 minutes (or some other amount of time). And as hard as it hit you, it then seems to leave, for a sudden return (or should I say onslaught) at another time. It also sounds like these acute spasms come when you are in bed at nite!?! I could be wrong about that. This is not how I experience it Mine is a chronic kind of a thing, without the intense pain that you exprience. When my feet are at rest they do not have any problem. That is not to say that the spasm is gone then, it is just not painful. The more I walk or put pressure on my foot, the more it seems to clench up. However, it is not always that way. Some periods of time, my foot feels relatively relaxed for no apparent reason. The foot is distorted, as I had said before. It is analagous to a person who needs braces for their teeth because of "crowding" In my case it is toe crowding. This is not, again, to say that it is not dystonia that you may have. It may be that you have a stronger form of it that comes on in an acute manner. I do not know enough about dystonia to differentiate.
Interesting that you said you had an auto accident about 8 yrs. ago. I had the same experience around 15 years ago, which was approx. 5-8 yrs. before I started to feel any of the earliest symptoms of PSP. In my auto accident I also had a concussion, but not any of the other problems you had such as amnesia (or did I have amnesia??? hmm, hmm???) Just kidding! I did not have amnesia. There could be something to these auto accidents, and brain trauma!?!?
Something that just came to mind was that you may be experiencing Restless Leg Syndrome (RLS). That might explain why none of the tests have shown anything. It seems that you may have some form of it. Just a hunch. I seems that you have the problem in bed at nite, which would be typical. As well, people describe real painful cramping or spasms along with the inability to keep from shaking their leg. It is something to keep in mind. B.T.W., RLS is
considered a Parkinsonism.
I'm going to guess that you might be British, although very Americanized !?!?? Good Nite! |
