Ultrasound imaging of 20 cases of progressive muscular dystrophy and 10 cases of suspected infantile spinal muscular atrophy in children was performed by us, as a double-blind pilot study matched against 25 controls. Open muscle biopsy was restricted to the muscular dystrophy group. The ultrasonographic findings were correlated with parameters such as functional disability of muscle and muscle biopsy features in the dystrophy group. It was interesting to observe that the muscle echogram was abnormal in both types of neuromuscular problems, the controls giving a normal muscle echogram. Ultrasonography was helpful in detection of unequivocal changes in our cases with mild clinical disability. It had a close correlation with changes in gross muscle architecture, as seen on muscle biopsy. Indexing Words: Ultrasound -
Neuromuscular problems
Real-time ultrasonography is a simple, noninvasive procedure that is most suitable for application in pediatric practice. The usefulness of real-time ultrasonography in assessment of neuromuscular problems in children has gained importance only in recent years, and there is thus very little literature on it.' The ultrasonographic appearance of various disorders in children such as progressive muscular dystrophies, infantile spinal muscular atrophy, congenital myopathies, and motor neuropathies has been found to be strikingly abnormaL2 Interpretation of ultrasonic scan findings depends on the echogenicity of muscle compared with the echogenicity of bone, as matched with controls. The normal ultrasonic scan of muscle shows a striking bone echogenicity in contrast to a relatively echo-free muscle zone.
In this article, we have done a pilot study using real-time ultrasonography in children with progressive muscular dystrophy and in infants with a clinical diagnosis of infantile spinal muscular atrophy in a n attempt to correlate their clinicopathologic profiles with scan findings.