RESULTS OF TREATMENT OF ATHETOSIS BY SECTION OF EXTRAPYRAMIDAL TRACTS IN THE SPINAL CORD

Abstract

<h3>CLASSIFICATION OF THE DYSKINESIAS</h3> Certain disorders characterized by abnormal involuntary muscular movements have been grouped together as "diseases of the extrapyramidal system," chiefly on the basis of the localization of the lesions observed at autopsy (Wilson,¹Herz²). They include athetosis, dystonia, torsion spasm, spasmodic torticollis, ballism, chorea, myoclonus and paralysis agitans. An important reason for excluding paralysis agitans from this list has already been given in a previous paper,³namely, that an extensive section of extrapyramidal motor pathways makes the tremor rigidity neither better nor worse. Further, recent pathologic investigations⁴have appeared to indicate that the alterations are by no means confined to the basal nuclei. No cases of chorea of either the Sydenham or the Huntington type have been sufficiently studied by modern physiologic methods to permit a comparison with the other diseases in the group. But the remaining syndromes in the list possess so