Charcot Marie Tooth Research Paper

Charcot Marie Tooth

CMT is short for Charcot Marie Tooth. A CMT is a disease named by three doctors who first discovered it. It is one of the most common inherited nerve disorders. There is an estimate of 1 in 2,500 people in the U.S. who have this, and 2.6 million people world wide although experts believe this number could be higher.

Now you may ask what is a CMT? A CMT is also called hereditary sensory and motor neuropathy. This is a disease that runs in families, and causes some problems with the sensory and motor nerves, the nerves that run from the arms, legs, spinal cord, and brain. This happens when parts of the nerves become damaged. Messages run along the nerves that make the nerves move slower, or have weak signals. Over some time

some early symptoms that you can have is clumsiness, slight difficulty in walking because of the trouble in picking up your feet, and weak leg muscles. Some common symptoms you may have are foot deformity, difficulty lifting foot at the ankle, curled toes, loss of lower leg muscle, numbness or burning in the feet or hands, feet hitting the floor hard when walking, weakness of the hips, legs, or feet, leg and hand cramps, loss of balance, and difficulty grasping and holding objects. Some later symptoms you can get are similar symptoms in the arms and hands, and a curve in the spine. some rare symptoms you can get are speech and swallowing difficulties, breathing difficulties, hearing loss, and vocal cord paralysis.

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They diagnose this disease by doing test like medical and family history, physical exam, nerve condition velocity test, Electromyography, and a genetic test. They treat CMT by physical and occupational therapy, braces and other orthopedic devices, surgery, and pain