The importance of medial plantar nerve conduction study in detectıon of polyneuropathy in inflammatory bowel disease
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.54029/2024fusKeywords:
polyneuropathy, medial plantar nerve, inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), peripheral neuropathy, medial plantar nerve conduction study, polyneuropathy detection, electrophysiology, subclinical neuropathy, crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, nerve action potential amplitudeAbstract
Background & Objective: Peripheral neuropathy is the most frequent neurologic complication of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). We aimed to evaluate the clinical utility of medial plantar nerve conduction study (NCS) in the detection of distal sensory polyneuropathy in IBD patients.
Methods: The study was performed with 21 Crohn’s disease (Group 1) patients, 24 Ulcerative Colitis (Group 2) patients without clinical peripheral neuropathy and 28 healthy participants (Group 3). Each patient group underwent electrophysiological conduction studies. The findings were analyzed statistically.
Results: Abnormal medial plantar nerve conduction was present on both sides in 11 (24.4 %) patients with IBD; 5 (11.1 %) patients had low sural nerve amplitude, and 5 (11.1 %) had low superficial peroneal nerve amplitude bilaterally. There were significant differences between the IBD groups (Group 1 and 2) and Group 3 in the mean sensory nerve action potential amplitude of the right medial plantar nerve (p<0.024), and in the mean sensory nerve action potential amplitude of the left medial plantar nerve (p<0.025). The polyneuropathy pattern was mostly of the sensory axonal type in patients with IBD.
Conclusions: These electrophysiologic findings indicate that peripheral neuropathy is more prevalent in IBD. In IBD patients the amplitudes of the medial plantar nerve were abnormal more than in the sural and superficial peroneal nerves.
