Disease Propagation in Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis: Insights and Hopes

Abstract

A feature that is common to all ALS patients is that motor manifestations at clinical onset are focal and they appear randomly in the body [3]. Once the focal onset in ALS occurs, motor impairment appears to spread outward to contiguous body regions. This suggests that the pathological process starting in a discrete region of motor neuron system propagates to adjacent motor neurons. When a diffuse motor neuron involvement is observed at onset, a multifocal onset rather than a noncontiguous pattern of disease propagation may be postulated [4].