Locomotor

ataxia Ataxia (from Greek α- negative prefix+ -τάξις rder= "lack of order") is a neurological sign consisting of lack of voluntary coordination of muscle movements that can include gait abnormality, speech changes, and abnormalities in e ...

is the inability to precisely control one's own bodily movements. __TOC__

Disease

People afflicted with this disease may walk in a jerky, non-fluid manner. They will not know where their arms and legs are without looking (i.e., a failure of

proprioception Proprioception ( ) is the sense of self-movement, force, and body position. Proprioception is mediated by proprioceptors, a type of sensory receptor, located within muscles, tendons, and joints. Most animals possess multiple subtypes of propri ...

), but can, for instance, feel and locate a hot object placed against their feet. It is often a symptom of

tabes dorsalis Tabes dorsalis is a late consequence of neurosyphilis, characterized by the slow degeneration (specifically, demyelination) of the neural tracts primarily in the Dorsal root ganglion, dorsal root ganglia of the spinal cord (nerve root). These pati ...

, which is a key finding in tertiary

syphilis Syphilis () is a sexually transmitted infection caused by the bacterium ''Treponema pallidum'' subspecies ''pallidum''. The signs and symptoms depend on the stage it presents: primary, secondary, latent syphilis, latent or tertiary. The prim ...

. It is caused by degeneration of the posterior (dorsal) white column of the spinal cord.

In popular culture

The effects of

neurosyphilis Neurosyphilis is the infection of the central nervous system by '' Treponema pallidum'', the bacterium that causes the sexually transmitted infection syphilis. In the era of modern antibiotics, the majority of neurosyphilis cases have been report ...

(such as locomotor ataxia) are dramatized in the story "Love O' Women" by

Rudyard Kipling Joseph Rudyard Kipling ( ; 30 December 1865 – 18 January 1936)''The Times'', (London) 18 January 1936, p. 12. was an English journalist, novelist, poet, and short-story writer. He was born in British Raj, British India, which inspired much ...

Bram Stoker Abraham Stoker (8 November 1847 – 20 April 1912), better known by his pen name Bram Stoker, was an Irish novelist who wrote the 1897 Gothic horror novel ''Dracula''. The book is widely considered a milestone in Vampire fiction, and one of t ...

death certificate A death certificate is either a legal document issued by a medical practitioner which states when a person died, or a document issued by a government civil registration office, that declares the date, location and cause of a person's death, a ...

named the cause of death as "Locomotor Ataxia 6 months", presumed to be a reference to

References

Neurodegenerative disorders {{nervoussystem-disease-stub