“New” Areas of Muscle Weakness
Question: When I had polio, my legs were completely paralyzed but my arms were not affected. When I recovered, I walked for many years with a very pronounced limp. I now have leg muscle weakness, use a long leg brace and a manual wheelchair. But I am beginning to experience pain and muscle weakness in my upper arms. Could I have weakness where I had never had polio weakness? Is it true that paralysis or even muscle weakness weren’t necessary for your whole body to be affected by PPS muscle weakness?
Dr. Bruno’s Response: Yes, that’s correct. Even if you weren't paralyzed, Dr. David Bodian showed in 1949, with 158 human autopsies of polio “non-survivors”, that if you had muscle weakness anywhere, 90% of your muscles and their motor neurons were damaged, even if not killed, by the poliovirus. Add decades of physical overuse and, wham, PPS muscle weakness! The overuse causes wearing out of remaining poliovirus-damaged neurons and produces weakness of muscles thought to be unaffected by polio.
Late onset muscle weakness can show up anywhere, regardless of the degree of initial paralysis…or none. Even "non-paralytic" polio survivors could have had wide-spread motor neuron damage but not enough in any one muscle to cause weakness initially. But those remaining, poliovirus-damaged neurons still fail with overuse abuse over time.
This article can help explain: "Non-Paralytic” Polio Causing PPS
For more information, please look in the Index of the Encyclopedia of Polio and PPS under the topics “muscle weakness” and “motor neuron”.