UMEM Educational Pearls

Category: Neurology

Title: What is Ataxia?

Keywords: cerebellar disease, tremor, nystagmus (PubMed Search)

Posted: 8/24/2016 by Danya Khoujah, MBBS
Click here to contact Danya Khoujah, MBBS

Ataxia is an important clinical sign of cerebellar pathology, but how is it actually described?

Stance ataxia: inability to stand with feet together for more than 30 seconds

Gait ataxia

Sensory ataxia: the first 2 elements, in addition to a positive Romberg sign

Truncal ataxia: oscillation of body while sitting or standing

Limb ataxia: functional impairment in performing actions such as writing or buttoning and improves with slowing down the movement

Dysdiadokinesia: impairment of rapidly alternating movement

Intention tremor: tested by finger-to-nose and heel-to-shin.

Dysmetria: pastpointing or undershooting on finger-chasing or shin-tap.

Dysarthria: irregular and slow speech with unnecessary hesitation

Nystagmus and other ocular disturbances, such as ocular flutter and opsoclonus.

The first 3 are present in both cerebellar pathology and loss of proprioceptive input, the rest are usually due to cerebellar pathology or ataxic syndrome.

References

Ashizawa T and Xia G. Ataxia. Continuum 2016;22(4):1208-1226