BACKGROUND Myasthenia gravis is a specific autoimmune disease characterised by weakness and fatigue. Respiratory muscle weakness has been studied using the determination of maximal respiratory pressures, but the response of respiratory centres is not well characterised. This study was undertaken to determine the breathing pattern and the central ventilatory drive in patients with mild and moder...

OBJECTIVE To evaluate dysphagia at the oropharyngeal stage of swallowing and to determine the pathophysiological mechanisms of dysphagia in patients with myasthenia gravis. METHODS Fifteen patients with myasthenia gravis with dysphagia and 10 patients without dysphagia were investigated by a combined electrophysiological and mechanical method described previously. Laryngeal movements were det...

Myasthenia gravis is an autoimmune disorder where antibodies against the nicotinic Ach receptor resulting in impaired transmission at the NM junction. A number of drugs have been reported to cause neuromuscular blockade and/or to increase weakness in myasthenia gravis. We report a case of myasthenia gravis in which the calcium channel blocker-nifedipine caused the worsening of the symptoms.

Plasmapheresis means elimination of plasma and replacement of it with other liquids. Effect of this treatment is confirmed in more than 50 diseases like myasthenia gravis, Guillain-Barre syndrome and TTP. This cross sectional study was done on 25 myasthenia gravis patients referred to Shahid Sadoughi hospital, Yazd, Iran 2004-2007. We report 22 myasthenia gravis patients' response to plasmapher...

Myasthenia gravis is an autoimmune disease caused, in most cases, by antibodies attaching to the acetylcholine receptor. Some myasthenia gravis patients have antibodies that bind in a cross-striational pattern to skeletal and heart muscle tissue sections (striational antibodies). These antibodies react with epitopes on the muscle proteins titin and ryanodine receptor, are found mainly in sera o...

Myasthenia gravis is a disorder of impaired neuromuscular transmission resulting in weakness and abnormal fatigability on exertion, improved by anti-acetyl cholinesterase drugs. A number of drugs are known to exacerbate myasthenia gravis or interfere with neuromuscular transmission. We report a case of D-penicillamine induced myasthenia gravis who developed ptosis, diplopia and easy fatigabilit...

Patients with Graves' orbitopathy have a higher probability of myasthenia gravis than does the normal population. Overlapping clinical features cause diagnostic confusion in such a situation. We herein report a patient with Graves' orbitopathy and myasthenia gravis (GO-MG) with normal left eyelid height, but in whom upper eyelid retraction was shown after edrophonium chloride administration. Up...

A study of curare sensitivity has been made in ocular myasthenia, myasthenia gravis, and the myasthenic syndrome sometimes associated with carcinoma, using a regional technique. Sensitivity is greater than in normal subjects. The injection of 0-125 mg d-tubocurarine resulted in a neuromuscular transmission block in all but a few of those cases with ocular myasthenia and in all cases of generali...

About 5-10% of patients with myasthenia gravis concomitantly have other autoimmune diseases. However, the coexistence of myasthenia gravis and pernicious anemia is rare. Here, we report a 73-year-old Taiwanese woman who developed myasthenia gravis 5 months after the onset of pernicious anemia. Her myasthenic and pernicious anemia symptoms markedly improved after pyridostigmine, prednisolone and...

BACKGROUND There are only rare reports of myasthenia gravis complicating human immunodeficiency virus infection. The role of immunomodulatory therapy is unknown. METHODS Case report and literature review. RESULTS The diagnosis of human immunodeficiency virus infection followed that of myasthenia gravis in a 35-year-old man. Clinical and electrophysiological features were diagnostic of gener...