Muscle Twitching Help: Foot Drop Strength Test for ALS

If you have muscle twitching and have googled twitching muscles, you've most likely stumbled upon some links for the deadly disease ALS. You now might think you have ALS, since muscle twitching is a symptom of incurable ALS. But if you read more about ALS, you'll realize that muscle twitching comes after muscle weakness. However, you may now suddenly be experiencing what you believe to be weakness in your muscles.

In ALS, one of the first muscles to go is often the muscles that control foot movement, particularly up and down movement. In ALS clinical muscle weakness, the result is what's known as a foot drop. The muscles that control the joint action of dorsiflexion no longer work, and thus, the foot drops. A person suffering from fear he or she has ALS might start thinking he has this foot drop. If he stumbles upon bunched-up carpet, right away he'll think foot drop.

He or she will perform endless strength tests for these muscles to check for the drop, and no matter how well he does these muscle strength tests, he'll never be assured he doesn't have foot drop. UNLESS, perhaps, he knows the right kinds of muscle strength tests to perform.

A person with clinical foot drop can't do these.

If you're suffering from foot drop obsession, there are exercises that if you CAN perform, you can eliminate the possibility of ALS. A person with clinical (pathological) foot drop will find it absolutely impossible to do the following:

Using the foot pedal while driving. Yes, as simple as this is, a person with ALS foot drop will not be able to do this. This action requires continuous dorsiflexion, the very muscles that, when healthy, prevent foot drop. Though these muscles don't work hard to operate the car's pedal, the continuous use of these muscles are significant. This test applies only if the person already normally uses the foot on the pedal (depending on driving habits).