Abnormal sensory evoked potentials in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis

Abstract

We have reviewed sensory evoked potential (EP) findings in 17 patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Somatosensory EPs were abnormal in 7 of 16 patients after lower-extremity stimulation and in 2 of 16 patients after upper-extremity stimulation. Brainstem auditory EP abnormalities were found in 2 of 12 patients. No abnormalities were noted on pattern reversal visual EPs in 12 patients. Overall, 47% of all ALS patients studied had at least one EP abnormality. EP evidence of CNS sensory dysfunction in ALS is more frequent than that noted clinically or pathologically and offers further support to previous observations of sensory system involvement in ALS.

Chronic Ergotamine Abuse: Evidence of Functional Impairment of Long Ascending Spinal Tracts

“…No cor relation with the clinical sensory deficits could be shown. A similar dissociation between clinical sensory findings and SEP abnormalities has also been described in other central nervous system diseases [4,10,13,16]. More over, apparently severe morphological deficits of the dorsal columns are not necessarily connected with clini cal deficits [3,17].…”

AAEM minimonograph 19: Somatosensory evoked potentials

“…SEP abnormalities have been found in patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, 53,94 and this accords with previous clinical and pathologic reports of sensory involvement in this disorder. Polo and colleagues have found the SEP elicited from both upper and lower limbs to be abnormal in patients with bulbospinal neuronopathy (Kennedy's syndrome).…”

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“…27 Sensory involvement can be demonstrated in advanced ALS but is never a prominent feature of the condition as it was in our patient. 2,9,18,20 Motor involvement as an important feature of sicca complex has rarely been reported. Yamashita and colleagues 30 described a man with progressive bulbar atrophy and Sjögren's syndrome.…”