What are the symptoms of rickets?

Rickets is a disease that is both unfamiliar and familiar to us, because this disease is very common in daily life, but we do not often see patients with this disease. Since many people do not know what rickets is or what symptoms it has, they do not know much about this disease. In fact, this disease is also called vitamin D deficiency, which is caused by bone mutation due to insufficient vitamin D in the body.

Rickets has two different names in children and adults. The one in children is called rickets, and the one in adults is called osteomalacia. It will seriously affect the development of the human body and have a great impact on the patient's life. Here are some of its symptoms.

1. Rickets

(1) Symptoms: mainly psychoneurological symptoms seen in the early and extreme stages of rickets. Children are irritable, restless, have restless sleep, night terrors, cry at night, and sweat a lot. Due to the stimulation of sweat, they often shake their heads and rub their pillows while sleeping, resulting in hair loss behind the pillow (pillow baldness). As the disease progresses, there is hypotonia, loosening of joint ligaments, and a swollen abdomen like a frog's belly. The children have delayed motor development and are late in walking independently. Severe rickets is often accompanied by anemia, hepatosplenomegaly, malnutrition, weakened systemic immunity, susceptibility to diarrhea, pneumonia, and is prone to becoming chronic. Children with low blood calcium may experience hypocalcemic convulsions (tetany), increased neuromuscular excitability, facial and limb muscle twitching or systemic convulsions. The seizures are brief and stop within a few minutes, but may also occur intermittently and frequently. Severe convulsions may cause suffocation due to laryngeal spasm.

(2) Bone changes: As the disease progresses, bone changes occur, which are more common in the most active stage of rickets. Bone changes are related to factors such as age, growth rate, and degree of vitamin D deficiency.

2. Common symptoms of osteomalacia are bone pain, muscle weakness, muscle spasm and bone tenderness. Early symptoms may not be obvious. Common symptoms include back, waist and leg pain, which worsens during activities. Muscle weakness is an important manifestation of vitamin D deficiency. At the beginning, patients have difficulty climbing stairs or standing up from a seat. Bone pain and muscle weakness exist at the same time. The patient develops a peculiar gait, known as a "duck walk," which eventually makes walking difficult and forces the patient to be bedridden. During physical examination, patients often have obvious tenderness over the sternum, ribs, pelvis and large joints. Skeletal deformities include shortened neck, drooping head, kyphoscoliosis; pigeon chest and narrow pelvis, which make delivery difficult. Many patients suffer pathological fractures.

The above is the introduction of the symptoms of rickets by experts. After reading it, do you have a better understanding of this disease? If you unfortunately find that you or someone around you suffers from rickets, please remain optimistic, face the illness bravely and seek timely treatment.