Introduction
Myopathy refers to a disease that attacks the muscle and is not related to any neuromuscular junction illness. Myopathy conditions are said to come as a result of a variety of causes. The different causes of myopathy include inheritance, infections, inflammation, and congenital causes among other several reasons. Congenital myopathy appears in diverse forms to young infants at birth or during their early days of growth. Congenital myopathy can be inherited through various modes and appear in different levels of severity. The multiple levels of severity in congenital myopathies include newborn lethality, middle year cases, foetal akinesia, and onset cases among others. Congenital myopathies are characterized by weakness of the skeletal muscle, hypotonia as well as the availability of some marks on muscle operation (Romero, Sandaradura and Clarke, 2013).
Myopathy mostly affects the proximal muscles. 14 per cent of all myopathy diseases in the whole world is inherited from parents and kins. Nevertheless, myopathy is more prevalent in males than in females. Becker muscular dystrophy and Duchenne muscular dystrophy are forms of myopathy that have been reported to be common among male children in the United States than female children. There are other myopathy disorders such as inflammatory myopathies which affect very few people but are more common in female than male. Other forms of myopathy are the metabolic myopathy disorders which have been rare in the past but are slowly gaining ground with a diagnosis steadily increasing among women. One other common type of myopathy is nemaline myopathy which is said to be the most diagnosed congenital myopathy affecting infants majorly. Nemaline myopathy comes with health problems related to breathing and eating among others. It is important to note that severe inflammatory myopathy disorders in adults cannot be cured, but their symptoms can be treated.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Normal Anatomy of the Muscle
Muscle tissues are made with the characteristic to allow movements. The cells that makeup muscles respond swiftly to stimulus. Further to that, muscles are contractible; this means that they can create a pulling force from shortening (Miller, 2015). The muscles contract to bring about movement of bones and thus the movement of body parts. The movement of the bones as a result of muscle contraction is because muscles are attached to bones on both ends. It is also important to note that when muscles move, they can do it either voluntarily or involuntarily due to either being under control or not. For example, movement of hands or legs happens as a result of voluntary muscle movement while the movement of eyelids may be involuntary.
The human body has three different types of muscles that include smooth, skeletal and cardiac muscles. The contraction of smooth muscles brings about the movement of involuntary movements that majorly takes place internally. The smooth muscles are majorly available in the reproductive system, the blood vessels, and the digestive system. The skeletal muscles are the muscles connected to the bones and are responsible for voluntary body movements such as walking (Padulo et al., 2016). The cardiac muscle has unique characteristics that appear as a multinucleated mass of branched fibers. These fibers are found in the heart Myocardium and exhibit rhythmic, rapid and well-coordinated contractions.
Normal Physiology of the Muscle System
As mentioned above, the human muscle system is responsible for body movements. It is important to mention that the muscle system of humans and other vertebrates works due to the control that is administered by the nervous system. Nevertheless, there are some muscles in the human system that is autonomous. The human muscle is composed of contractile cells and comes from the embryonic germ cells (Kenney, Wilmore and Costill, 2018). Generally, the muscle work through creating force and bringing about movements of organs and body parts. Moreover, many movements that are made by the muscle, whether intentional or unintentional are administered by the brain and are responsible for the normal survival of humans.
The muscles consist of muscle cells which carry myofibrils which also has myosin to help support the functions of the muscle. The cells within the muscle are held together through the existence of perimysium, and they form packages that then form the muscle when held together. It is important to note that muscles work on energy and that energy is normally available within the muscle cells in the form of adenosine triphosphate (ATP). This same energy is released regularly and is responsible for all the functions of the muscle.
Mechanism of Pathophysiology of Myopathies
Myopathy brings about several changes to the human muscle system whenever the disease gets to the body. The skeletal muscles happen to be the most vulnerable muscle to myopathies and one which see effects anytime the disease gets to the human body. Most changes that come about when the muscles are infected by the disease bring about weakness and pain to the body bearing the fact that the muscles play a vital role in body movements and locomotion. Firstly, myopathy destroys muscle fibers and make them shrink; when the muscle fibers shrink, they reduce in size and cause a lot of pain to the body. It should be noted that the muscle fibers hold on the bones and other body parts to make the movements when they get infected with myopathy, they get destroyed and hence the reduction. Additionally, they bring about pain and fail to function in moving the bones effectively. Apart from that, the pathophysiology of myopathy could be responsible for making the blood elements attack the muscles. This is common with inflammatory myopathy, and when it happens, the muscle cells become unable to contract. The blood cells and all other blood elements surround the muscle fibers and hinder them from making contractions. Failure makes contractions by the muscle fibers could bring about swelling and pain on the area affected.
Prevention of Myopathies
Apart from cases of genetic inheritance, some activities can promote the prevention of muscle disorder and live free of myopathy. To begin with, avoiding hard training that may end up making the muscles overstretch is one way to stay free of the damage of the muscles. When one involves in too much exercise and with the use of alit of energy and muscles, the muscles contract until they can contract no more. The result of this can be related to muscle disorders.
Another preventive measure to help to avoid myopathy is to avoid carrying heavy loads. Heavy loads also lead to damage to muscle tissues due to overstretching. Going for regular tests is also a preventive way of managing the disorder. This is necessary when one suspects the genetic relationship. Going for tests is good for enabling early detection which is easy to manage.
Treatment of Myopathies
Treatment of Myopathies can be done through a variety of ways depending on the preference of the physician. One common way that is used by many physicians in handling treatment for myopathy is the use of drug therapy. Once the condition has been diagnosed through tests, the physician launches the treatment process which is based on the management of the condition. Genetic counselling is one important procedure in managing the condition. It involves making the victim understand and understand the genetic cause of their condition. Medication involves the use of remedies like drug albuterol which are good for strengthening muscles. Apart from the drugs, myopathy can be managed through orthopedic care which involves the use of support kits, conducting surgeries for repairs (Moghadam, Aggarwal and Oddis, 2015).
Clinical Relevance of Myopathies
The information on the pathophysiology holds some crucial relevance that may help the system of medication or the victim of the bone disorder. Firstly, treatment and management of myopathy are good in adding knowledge and skills in the field of myopathy. Most importantly, muscle and bone-related disorders can get to enjoy some resources from the treatment. The genetic counselling that is used to manage the condition is important in giving hope to the people that all is not lost and that managing the disease is one of the possibilities. Further to that, the prevention of myopathy through reducing hard training is good for gaining strength which is also good for health.
The knowledge about myopathy is generally key to the clinics in understanding the damage of muscles caused by accidents. The physicians, with the knowledge, can easily handle the cases of muscle tissue damage caused by accidents.
Conclusion
Myopathy can be said to be a complicated disorder that affects the muscle system of the human body. The human body tasks the muscle system to conduct many activities that are essential for survival. Unfortunately, such disorders which damage the muscle hinder the normal function ability of the muscle system as well as rearrange the anatomy of the muscle system. It is worth noting that myopathy has no specific cure and no specific drug can be said to be its remedy. Nevertheless, doctors and nurses have devised a variety of ways to manage the disorder. Preventing the body muscles from being affected by myopathy offers the best solution for patients with myopathy. Reducing the energy used during training and avoiding the damaging muscle tissues which do much of the job is also an affirmative remedy.
References
Kenney, W. L., Wilmore, J. H., & Costill, D. L. (2018). Physiology of sport and exercise. Human Kinetics.
Miller, J. M. (2015). Functional anatomy of normal human rectus muscles. Vision Research, 29(2), 223-240.
Moghadam-Kia, S., Aggarwal, R., & Oddis, C. V. (2015). Treatment of inflammatory myopathy: emerging therapies and therapeutic targets. Expert review of clinical immunology , 11 (11), 1265-1275.
Padulo, J., Oliva, F., Frizziero, A., & Maffulli, N. (2016). Muscles, Ligaments and Tendons Journal–Basic principles and recommendations in clinical and field Science Research: 2016 Update. Muscles, ligaments and tendons journal, 6(1), 1.
Romero, N. B., Sandaradura, S. A., & Clarke, N. F. (2013). Recent advances in nemaline myopathy. Current opinion in neurology, 26(5), 519-526.
