Idiopathic respiratory synkinesis: A case series

Respiratory Shoulder Synkinesis: A Rare Case Report

“…have described two cases of idiopathic RS with the pectoralis major muscle, which was described with clinical and sonographic synkinetic movements. [ 5 ] The unique features noted in our patient include simultaneous synchronous contraction of the diaphragm, intercostal muscle, and pectoralis major–minor muscles, which have not been reported before. Though the patient had a trivial fall two years before the symptom onset, there was no definite preceding injury or insult to the cervicothoracic roots raising the possibility of idiopathic nature.…”

Breathing Muscles Produces a “Dystonia Like” Contraction

“…BMs have been reported post-trauma, post-BBP, post-surgery associated with spinal cord pathologies, post-thoracotomy and idiopathic. [ 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 14 15 ] In these 2 patients what is different is that the intermittent but recurrent firing of multiple motor units in the BMs had caused persistent contraction of these muscles leading to a dynamic joint defect which puzzled the clinician. This could be explained by the fact that the muscle had good recovery post-surgery as demonstrated by the CMAP amplitude and adding to that the continuous input from the inspiration was producing a “dystonia” like effect on the muscle.…”

A Reflection on Motor Overflow, Mirror Phenomena, Synkinesia and Entrainment

“…The most common form of synkinesia is the facial synkinesia, commonly occurring after Bell's palsy 58 and clinically characterized by contraction of additional facial mimetic musculature (ie, eye closing) accompanying volitional facial movements such as smiling or chewing; however, other types of synkinesia have also been described. These include the ocular‐jaw synkinesia (observed in PD, characterized by jaw movements ipsilateral to the horizontal gaze deviation), 59 the respiratory synkinesia (also called “breathing arm,” characterized by contraction of one or multiple upper limb muscles together with the diaphragm muscle; usually reported in the context of an upper limb injury) 60 and arm‐leg synkinesia (sporadically reported in patients with frontoparietal or thalamic stroke, 61,62 prion disease, 63 or parkinsonian conditions such as PD and cortico‐basal syndrome) 64 . In this latter case, voluntary hand movement may be accompanied by similar movements in the ipsilateral leg, or vice versa 1,65 .…”