If youre curious about your spasticity triggers, your best bet is to look inward.
Positive spasticity symptoms are things like excessive or exaggerated muscle movements.
You may have an increase in involuntary jerking of the arms or legs and muscle spasms, for example.
Spasticity triggers can vary, but there are a few common ones like temperature changes.
Spasticity causes|Spasticity triggers|Sudden spasticity|Night spasticity|Spasticity that comes and goes
What causes spasticity, anyway?
Some of these conditions include:
Each of these medical conditions interrupts how your nerves talk to each other.
Theyre the result of whats called an upper motor neuron lesion or injury.
So, what are some common spasticity triggers?
However, its not entirely unclearwhycertain triggers set off muscle spasms in most cases.
Usually I check the bladder first because its the easiest thing to find out.
This leads us to the first common trigger for spasticity: infections.
UTIs are a major contributing factor to increased spasticity.
Typically if you have a UTI, it might feel like youre peeing fire.
But if you have a spinal cord injury, you may not experience these sensations due to nerve damage.
Instead youll have to rely on other symptoms, such as increased spasticity and urine color changes.
Whether viral, bacterial, or fungal,anykind of infection can potentially trigger your spasticity.
This includes respiratory infections as well as oral and skin infections.
Getting offtrack from your bladder emptying schedule can lead to urinary or bladder retention that triggers your spasticity.
This can stimulate your nerves, which can set off those muscle spasms.
Unfortunatelyconstipationis a side effect of a lot of medicines you may take for your neuromuscular disorder.
These triggers include ingrown toenails, pressure ulcers, tight clothing, and wounds.
Why do these seemingly unrelated things trigger muscle spasms?
Basically any kind ofskin irritationcan trigger those overactive nerves, causing spasms.
In the case of tight clothes, its the constant pressure on the skin that does it.
Whether itsmuscle fatigueor generally feeling wiped out, that so-tired-you-cant-lift-your-head feeling can play a factor in spasticity.
Again, any kind of irritation or change to the body can trigger spasms.
Sometimes increased spasticity can be a side effect from a condition progressing.
For example, if you have M.S.
and go through a period when your symptoms come back or become more intense, spasticity can flare too.
Spasticity can also become more pronounced after a recurrence, such as having another stroke.
This one seems to hit people with M.S.
who were assigned female at birth especially hard.
An estimated 69% of people assigned female at birth with relapsing-remitting M.S.
This means your body may not recognize when its hot or cold.
), and when its hot, you may not realize a sweater is a bit overkill.
What causes sudden spasticity?
Spasticity can come on so fast that youre left reeling in pain, wondering exactly what happened.
I consider a sudden increase in spasticity like an early warning rig, Dr. Cabahug explains.
It tells me there is something going on, and I have to further evaluate my patient.
Is spasticity worse at night for some people?
The idea that spasticity is worse at night is a controversial one.
Does spasticity get worse over time?
Why does spasticity come and go?
Spasticity symptoms can come and go because there are a lot of potential triggers out there.
