Symptoms of Myelitis

Perhaps many people don’t know much about myelitis because this disease is not very common in life. However, learning some knowledge about diseases is also a guarantee for yourself. Myelitis is actually a disease caused by a virus infecting the spinal cord. This disease usually occurs in young and middle-aged people. The onset of the disease is sudden and may be accompanied by fever or vomiting.

Everyone needs to learn about the symptoms of myelitis, because general symptoms do not let people know that this is myelitis. Many of its symptoms are similar to other diseases, so everyone must pay attention, otherwise it will easily be confused with other diseases.

A few days or 1 to 2 weeks before the onset of the disease, there is often a history of upper respiratory tract or intestinal infection, a history of vaccination, or predisposing factors such as cold, overwork, weight bearing, sprains, etc. The disease develops suddenly. Complete paraplegia may occur within a few hours to 1 to 2 days. Some patients have precursor symptoms such as back pain, tightness, limb numbness, and weakness before the onset of the disease, which gradually develop into complete paralysis after a few to ten days.

The clinical symptoms of myelitis may vary depending on the location and extent of the lesion. Because the thoracic cord segments are long and the blood supply to some segments is poor, lesions often affect the thoracic cord. The initial symptoms are often numbness and weakness in both lower limbs, back pain in the corresponding part of the lesion, a feeling of tightness, or difficulty urinating. After 2 to 3 days, the disease develops to its peak, with complete paralysis below the level of the lesion, loss of sensation, little or no sweating, and retention of stool and urine.

In the early stage of the disease, the patient is in the spinal shock stage and has flaccid paralysis of the limbs, which is the so-called soft paralysis. After 2 to 4 weeks, the limbs gradually become spastic paralysis, also known as scleroplegia, and the urination problem changes from urinary retention to urinary incontinence. When the lesion involves the cervical spinal cord, quadriplegia may occur. If the upper cervical segment (above C4) is affected, breathing difficulties may also occur. Cervical enlarged myelitis may cause flaccid paralysis of both upper limbs and spastic paralysis of both lower limbs. When the lesion is in the lumbar spinal cord, the lower limbs show flaccid paralysis and muscle atrophy can be seen in the early stages. When the lesion is in the cuboid spinal cord, there is obvious sphincter disorder but no obvious paralysis. In addition, there is also an ascending myelitis. This type of myelitis has an acute onset, and the lesions can develop rapidly from bottom to top, often reaching a peak within 1 to 2 days, or even within a few hours. Paralysis of the limbs, difficulty swallowing, slurred speech, difficulty breathing, and even respiratory muscle paralysis and death may occur.

The above is an introduction to the symptoms of myelitis. I hope that after reading it, you will have a clearer understanding of the symptoms of this disease. Understanding the disease can actually help us better prevent the occurrence of the disease, so everyone must learn more about the disease so that we can do better in prevention.