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The natural history of long thoracic and spinal accessory neuropathies
Author(s) -
Friedenberg Scott M.,
Zimprich Todd,
Harper C. Michel
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
muscle and nerve
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.025
H-Index - 145
eISSN - 1097-4598
pISSN - 0148-639X
DOI - 10.1002/mus.10068
Subject(s) - medicine , natural history , electromyography , accessory nerve , retrospective cohort study , compound muscle action potential , nerve conduction , surgery , cohort , physical medicine and rehabilitation , electrophysiology
A cohort of 106 patients with electrodiagnostically confirmed long thoracic neuropathy (50 patients) or spinal accessory neuropathy (56 patients) seen at the Mayo Clinic over a 22‐year period were retrospectively studied to better understand the natural history of these disorders and to determine the role of electrodiagnostic testing in predicting prognosis. Mean follow‐up was 48 and 50 months, respectively. Good functional recovery was generally observed regardless of the results of electrodiagnostic studies, but improvement in the amplitude of the spinal accessory compound muscle action potential on serial nerve conduction studies tended to predict a good outcome. No electrodiagnostic findings correlated with poor outcome. Traumatic neuropathies generally did worse than neuropathies of other causes. In spinal accessory neuropathies, involvement of the dominant limb, scapular winging, and impaired arm elevation were associated with a poor outcome. Our data suggest that, contrary to other focal neuropathies, the electrodiagnostic findings do not predict functional outcome in these neuropathies. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Muscle Nerve 25: 000–000, 2002