do muscle spasms cause blackouts?

Question

my mother has fybromalgia which is a muscle disorder like arthirtis. It is very painful and sometimes she gets muscle spasms and you know muscle spasms can be very powerful and painful. This morning she got a spasm in her back while she was standing and she couldn't move because the pain is so bad so she just collapsed and hit her head on the edge of a table.I heard the fall when I was upstairs and I flew down to see what had happened.Then when we tried to help her up she didn't know what had happened. She seems alright. She remembers everything except for the fall.I was crying. I am worried because I was thinking that maybe it was a mild stroke or something. I want her to go to the hospital but she wont go. And plus she may have a head injury.So I know that fybromalgia cause muscle spasms but do muscle spasms cause blackouts. Thank You

Answer 1

As a rule, muscle spasms don't cause blackouts, but a spasm in the back can definitely cause you to collapse. From what you described, it sounds like your mom might have toppled over from a back spasm, and then hit her head. Its very common to have no recollection of things that occur just prior to a concussion. A stroke seems unlikely since she has no apparent stroke symptoms. If a stroke had been severe enough to cause a person to black out, they would probably have some obvious symptoms.

You should be more concerned about possible complications from the head injury - sometimes bleeding or swelling occurs after a head injury, and it starts causing problems a few days later. If you can't talk her into seeing the doc for the head injury - watch very closely for any signs of neurological problems: nausea, headache, vision problems, dizziness, loss of coordination, speech problems, large mood swings, or any other behavior that is just not normal for her. If you do see signs of a brain injury and she refuses to go to the doc - call 911 as a last resort and tell the dispatcher what you wrote in this question. Good Luck!

Answer 2

Hummm - no more MSG for you! My guess is a small epileptic seizure... the problem with epilepsy, nobody knows much about it. I had a seizure in college (I had the flu) and never had another all my life... While I had a friend who become quite epileptic and had lots of full-out seizures. If this continues, you can treat it with magnesium and taurine - not sure of the dosage. Taurine is cheap - it's an amino acid which you make in your body - might be you don't make enough. good luck with that.