What is guylian bar syndrome?

Answer 1

What is the Guillain-Barre Syndrome? ...Pronounced, ghee-yan bah-ray, Guillain-Barre Syndrome is a neurological disorder in which the body's immune system attacks part of the Peripheral Nervous System. You may recall that the Peripheral Nervous System (PNS) is the part of the nervous system which consists of everything but the brain and spinal cord, which we call the Central Nervous System (CNS).

All the nerves and nerve cells outside your Central Nervous System make up your Peripheral Nervous System. These include the spinal and cranial nerves, ganglia, and plexuses. Their task is to relay information from your brain and spinal cord to the rest of your body and from your body to your brain and spinal cord.
The PNS consists of 12 pairs of cranial nerves, which emerge from your brain, and mainly send messages too and from your head and neck, lots of which include our senses. It also contains 31 pairs of spinal nerves, which branch off from your spinal cord and supply the rest of your body, such as the organs and muscles.
With the help of our peripheral nerves, we are able to carry out voluntary and involuntary actions, like picking up a fork, clapping our hands or riding a bike. These are voluntary actions.
In contrast, our heart beat and intestinal functions occur without our conscious control. These are involuntary actions and are regulated by our autonomic nervous system. The autonomic part of your Peripheral Nervous System ensures that all our internal organs and glands function smoothly.

Now that we have established why the Peripheral Nervous System is so important to our wellbeing, we can see why Guillain-Barre Syndrome (GBS) is such a devastating disorder.

Characterized by muscle weakness, paralysis of the limbs and breathing muscles, onset of the disorder is sudden and unexpected. GBS can develop over hours or days, or may take up to a month. Symptoms are progressive, increasing in intensity until certain muscles can't be used at all. Occassionally, a patient can become almost totally paralysed. Once the disorder interferes with breathing, blood pressure and heart rate, it becomes a medical emergency and hospitalisation is the only option.

Though possibly life threatening due to symptoms, most patients will recover from even the most severe cases, with perhaps a residual degree of weakness.

Who is at risk? ...Though rare, Guillain-Barre Syndrome can affect anybody, any age, any sex. Mostly it affects patients a few days or weeks after a respiratory or gastrointestinal viral infection, or following recent surgery. No one knows what triggers GBS in some people and not others, nor what sets it in motion.

What happens? ...The body's own immune system begins to attack the body itself, rather than it's normal enemy, foreign material and invading organisms. The target appears to be the myelin sheath, which surrounds the axons of many peripheral nerves. Sometimes the axons themselves are the target.
Axons, are nerve fibers that are capable of rapidly conducting impulses away from a neuron (nerve cell). Axons can be very long, in some cases over a metre in length, and can carry impulses at a rate of anything up to 100 metres per second or greater.
The Myelin Sheath of a neuron consists of fat-containing cells that insulate the axon from electrical activity. This insulation acts to increase the rate of transmission of nerve impulses. A gap exists between each myelin sheath cell along the axon. Since fat inhibits the propagation of electricity, the signals jump from one gap to the next.
Thus, nerve impulse, speed, strength and accuracy are degraded to the point where signals do not reach the muscles, and the body cannot respond to commands originating in the brain. Equally, sensory signals from the rest of the body and outside the body are interrupted before they can reach the brain, and the brain begins to fail to respond to internal and external stimuli. Alternatively, the brain may receive incorrect signals, that result in tingling or pain sensations.

Perhaps where Guillain-Barre is preceeded by viral infections or the like, it is possible that the immune system treats changes in the nervous system tissue as a foreign threat to the body. It may also be possible that a viral or bacterial infection steers the immune system into making incorrect choices when deciding what is foreign material or an invading organism. Working on this problem may keep neurological scientists, immunologists and virologists busy for some time.

How is Guillain-Barre Syndrome treated? ...We have already mentioned that there is no cure for GBS. However, several treatment options are available, but due to the nature of this disorder, these are highly individualized and closely monitored in hospital.
Treatment mainly consists of watching for fluctuations in a patient's body functions while the nervous system recovers from the damage done by the immune system. Part of this may include heart monitors and respirators to assist bodily functions.
Plasmapheresis (a process which separates the red and white blood cells from the plasma) and high-dose immunoglobulin therapy (intravenous protein injections) may be necessary in some cases. Manual movement of limbs to maintain flexibility and muscle strength can help the patient to recover their ranges and speed of motion quickly.

Following apparent recovery of GBS, some patients experience recurrences in the form of abnormal sensations, typically in the limbs, as it is normal for the longer nerve fibres to suffer damage over much longer lengths than some of the main body nerves. These sensations may consist of numbness, tingling, burning, skin 'crawling', pain, muscle spasm and cramp. There may also be long term emotional problems and exhaustion or muscle fatique.

Answer 2

Guillan Barre?

Long story short - it's a condition of unknown eitology (meaning nobody really knows what causes it) that is an inflammatory disorder that affects the muscles and nerves and causes extreme weakness and some pain. Some cases, it's enough to stop someone from breathing. It can progress in days or weeks and can take up to a year or more to fully recover.

Answer 3

This Site Might Help You.

RE:
What is guylian bar syndrome?

Answer 4

I got GBS last year and spent 3 weeks in the ER and was 99% paralysed.My whole body shut down and i needed people to do EVERYTHING for me. Then i spent 4 weeks in In Patient rehab learning to do EVERYTHING again.Then months in out patient rehab.
When i say Everything i mean Everything, eat,drink walk,talk,breath,go to bathroom with no help or meds etc...
The scariest momnet for me and my family but i overcame it,and i'm almost back to 100%.
So if you now some one that has it, they REALLY need your support right now.

Answer 5

Good answers above. By the way, Andy Griffith had this some years back and took, I believe two or three years for full recovery.

Answer 6

I am from Australia. This is the two cents worth of MY opinion. Firstly - when we have a story like this... it is VERY easy to get swept up in the media frenzy. Take a step back and see where the government is coming from. There have been cases in the past where they had to do this - because the people with disability coming in the country WILL drain the nation resources. There have been cases where families bring elderly parents from overseas to Australia for a visit . They then got very sick and was hospitalised - for over many months and they cost the community thousands of dollars PER DAY (no travel insurance and the families ran out of money & resources). So - in that respect, I can see where the government is coming from. Same goes with people with a disability who will need ON-GOING health care here. I work in the community care sector where I provide support to disability and elderly target group and I do know how extremely draining it is to the tax payer - and with demand growing and higher expectation of services and that the government pays for everything (but this is another contentious issue which is not relevant to this discussion) - the government really have to look at future planning. And before you all make judgements - you need to fully understand where Australia is heading in the next 20 - 30 years in regards to health and welfare and population trends. Right..... enough with the devil's advocate.. now, to THIS particular case. I have seen the print news and TV report. It seems this is the knee jerk reaction piece of media as it involved the word "Down's syndrome" and the word "disability" . And let it be said that "Never let the truth get in the way of a good story". The government has NOT made a final decision. There is a lot of time yet to appeal. And I am sure this is not the only case the government is considering. MY OPINION though is that the comment by the department that Lukas "could potentially be a cost burden to the community" is rather pathetic. Lukas has Down's Syndrome - certainly. But the syndrome in itself is NOT ground to say this. For those who has seen the footage - he is a bright young boy who will likely needs minimal support. And I 'm sure his father is well qualifed to supply that. His physical condition is good and does not present any severe functional disability.Apart from his obvious facial feature, he is pretty much a kid like any other kids. While I understand that the government has a case to look into, I can not see that THIS PARTICUALR case will hold up as a "could potentially.... a cost burden to the community" Well.. that is MY thought on the matter. Let the thumbs down flood begins.