Hi Dave,
I think that we are making some confusion regarding lesions of motor
neurons.
You found strange that a patient with T10 spinal cord injury had spasticity
bilateraly on the lower limbs, but it seems completely reasonable to me.
In fact, the spinal cord injury is mostly an upper motor neuron desease.
Following the traumatic injury, there is rupture of the descending motor
piramidal tracts (cortico-spinal). If the injury was by the level of T10, of
course some lower motor neurons of that specific level would be involved.
However, the lower motor neurons for the lower limbs would remain intact
(they are not at T10 level) while the axons coming from the cortex are torn.
Consequently, there will be spasticity on the lower limbs because the spinal
reflexes are intact and the descending stimulation was interrupted.
If anyone on the forum disagrees about that, please let me know.
Best Regards,
Guilherme - Brazil
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