Prognostic Usefulness of Motor Unit Number Index (MUNIX) in Patients Newly Diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis.
J Clin Med 2023;
12:5036. [PMID:
37568439 PMCID:
PMC10420094 DOI:
10.3390/jcm12155036]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/18/2023] [Revised: 07/25/2023] [Accepted: 07/28/2023] [Indexed: 08/13/2023] Open
Abstract
The MUNIX technique allows us to estimate the number and size of surviving motor units (MUs). Previous studies on ALS found correlations between MUNIX and several clinical measures, but its potential role as a predictor of disease progression rate (DPR) has not been thoroughly evaluated to date. We aimed to investigate MUNIX's ability to predict DPR at a six-month follow up.
METHODS
24 ALS patients with short disease duration (<24 months from symptoms' onset) were enrolled and divided according to their baseline DPR into two groups (normal [DPR-N] and fast [DPR-F] progressors). MUNIX values were obtained from five muscles (TA, APB, ADM, FDI, Trapezius) and averaged for each subject.
RESULTS
MUNIX was found to predict DPR at follow up in a multivariable linear regression model; namely, patients with lower MUNIX values were at risk of showing greater DPR scores at follow up. The result was replicated in a simple logistic regression analysis, with the dichotomic category "MUNIX-Low" as the independent variable and the outcome "DPR-F" as the dependent variable.
CONCLUSIONS
our results pave the way for the use of the MUNIX method as a prognostic tool in early ALS, enabling patients' stratification according to their rates of future decline.
Collapse