CMT or CIDP

I found a few things that are listed to make it more likely to be CMT compared to CIDP. It seems none of these are absolute, but they tend to indicate that it is one or the other.

With CMT,
Usually the symptoms start when someone is young; usually a person is clumbsy from childhood.
Usually the symptoms slowly get worse.
Usually there are losses of muscles at the foot or hand end of the limbs–usually foot earlier than hand.
Usually there are foot deformities and/or foot drop.
Usually the motor nerve conduction velocities are uniformly slowed (whereas in CIDP, the motor nerve conduction velocities are variable in different nerves/parts of the body in a manner described as patchy and assymmetric.

CMT is about 25 times as common as CIDP. CMT is the most common inherited neuropathy and CIDP is considered rare. CMT is found in about 1 person out of 2500 (or 40 people per 100,000) and CIDP is found in about 1.6 people per 100,000. Because CMT is relatively “common”, some people can get unlucky and have both CMT and CIDP.

They have found about 30 different genes causing CMT and other hereditary neuropathies and it is expected that there may be a total of 50 different genes or so when they find them all. there is great progress being made. There is also progress being made on what may help in CMT and so even if CMT runs in your family (and perhaps also his dad’s family) and Connor was unlucky enough to get the 1 in 2 chance to have also gotten it, there may be ways known to help him a lot more by the time he might have symptoms of it. This is probably the most important thing for you to hold on to–that even if you were to have CMT, it does not mean than Conner would have it and even if he had it, he might not have to face as much problems as you have had to face.

WithHope for a cure of these diseases