Twitching and sore muscles

[Haydun]

This is already my 3rd post in this forum, but I just can't think clear anymore. I hope someone will help me to find answers to my following questions.

I'm a 21 year old male from Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Now a month ago my calves started to twitch,the twitching occured sometimes on more places of one calf at the same time, the twitchings were very short but constant there. A week later my feet also started to twitch, and my calves and feet started to feel sore. My doctor keeps telling me that i don't need to see a neurologist. Tonight i woke up with pain in my front upper leg. I'm so worried that i have ALS/MS. How worried should I be? I don't have ALS in my family history. I try to relax and don't think about it, but i constantly experience pain in my calves and now also in my upperleg and it freaks me out. I have no difficulties walking up and down the stairs except for pain.

Are these ALS symptomps? If not, what else? How worried should I be and how important is it to see a neurologist (wich can take a month in NL)? And are the twitching caused by ALS constantly, with no rest between days?

I would really appreciate comments

[Dr Sharma]

Hi there.  There are certain causes responsible for muscle twitching like diet deficiency, drug overdose, and side effects of diuretics, corticosteroids, estrogens, exercise, benign twitches, and nervous system conditions like amyotrophic lateral sclerosis or ALS, muscle dystrophy, spinal muscular atrophy and myopathy. Your neurologist needs to look into these conditions one by one. The other possible cause could be multiple sclerosis and is a diagnosis of exclusion. The symptoms of multiple sclerosis are loss of balance, muscle spasms, numbness in any area, problems with walking and coordination, tremors in one or more arms and legs. Bowel and bladder symptoms include frequency of micturition, urine leakage, eye symptoms like double vision uncontrollable rapid eye movements, facial pain, painful muscle spasms, tingling, burning in arms or legs, depression, dizziness, hearing loss, fatigue etc. The treatment is essentially limited to symptomatic therapy so the course of action would not change much whether MS has been diagnosed or not. Apart from clinical neurological examination, MRI shows MS as paler areas of demyelination, two different episodes of demyelination separated by one month in at least two different brain locations. Spinal tap is done and CSF electrophoresis reveals oligoclonal bands suggestive of immune activity, which is suggestive but not diagnostic of MS. Demyelinating neurons, transmit nerve signals slower than non-demyelinated ones and can be detected with EP tests. These are visual evoked potentials, brain stem auditory evoked response, and somatosensory evoked potential. Slower nerve responses in any one of these is not confirmatory of MS but can be used to complement diagnosis along with a neurological examination, medical history and an MRI in addition, a spinal tap. Therefore, it would be prudent to consult your neurologist with these concerns. Take care

[Rab19978]

Hi hayden

I am experiencing the same problem. What ever hapened to you - did you get better?

Thanks!

[Jrsygrl109]

do you have any back or neck problems?  the back of arm arm used to twitch like crazy until I had a c4-6 fusion performed.  I think a visit to a neurologist is in order.  it only takes a month to get an appt with a neurologist in the Netherlands? - here in America it takes 6 - 12 weeks (and that is with private insurance) !! Unless it is an emergency, like a stroke - then the hospital 'assigns' a neurologist to your case.