Question Title: benign fasciculation

i have been told by a specialist from this description that i have benign fasciculation.

muscle spasams in varios locations of the body not always the same location.

recently very bad in my left forearm, the forearm literaly jumps a couple of inches, repetedly about once a second.

on one ocasion it had worked itself so hard that it felt like i'd pulled a muscle afterwards.

the fact that the symptoms seem to be geting worse wories me.

how bad can things get?

what can be done about it? eg.diet, medication, lifestyle.

should i seek a second opinion? have blood tests? x rays?

advice and further reference would be apreciated.

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Dear Michael
I would agree with your specialist that this probably represents benign fasiculations.
As always it is difficult to come to a definitive diagnosis on the basis of
a verbal description only, however you would appear to have some form of
benign muscle disease characterized by muscle twitching and fasciculation.
I say this is benign because it is not accompanied by progressive muscle
weakness, changes in muscle tone, swallowing or breathing problems.
I am unclear as to how far your specialist went in terms of investigating this problem but
the only way to achieve a definitive diagnosis in this case will be
to have the electrical activity in your muscles tested by means of an EMG
examination.
This involves inserting a fine needle into the muscle and recording electrical activity.
In your case this will probably show excess excitability of muscle but it should also reassure you that there is no evidence of a serious underlying disease.
If the symptom is very troubling there are medications which stabilize the muscle cell membranes and cause the twitching to settle down, may people are sufficiently reassured by a comprehensive evaluation that this is no longer necessary.
If you are very stressed, tense, nervous or have just exercised these twitches may be more prominent at certain times.

michael.

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