In the article, we consider the causes and treatment of hand tremor in the elderly, as well as in young people. What is this pathology? Hand tremor is an intense contraction of the muscles of the hands and arms or tremors in the limbs of an involuntary nature. The occurrence of this pathology occurs with arbitrary movements or at rest.
What is it?
Such muscle contractions often allow you to carry out only gross work, and actions that require fine motor skills of the hands are not available to a person in this situation. For example, threading a needle into the eye of a needle or writing something to such a patient is extremely difficult. This manifestation is enhanced by excessive muscle tension, increased concentration of attention, severe fatigue, hypothermia.
The causes and treatment of hand tremor are presented below.
Most often, the violation affects the hands, a little less often - other parts of the body that are located in the middle of the body. The elderly are most susceptible to such involuntary hand trembling, however, the disease can also develop at a young age. Very often, experts do not attribute this condition to one form or another of independent diseases. Tremor of the body, hands or head is considered, as a rule, one of the specific symptoms of various diseases.
Causes of Hand Tremor
The causes of this phenomenon can be divided into two main groups. The first of these includes the usual physiological tremor, which may be a functional disorder that is temporary in nature and does not always indicate the presence of any disease.
The reasons for this phenomenon may be:
- Increased emotionality. Such tremor of the hands with severe excitement can occur in neurotic individuals, as well as in people whose professional activity is associated with the presence of constant stress.
- Depression, as well as a variety of post-traumatic stress disorders, traces of severe stress.
- Accentuation of character. For example, with hysteroid psychopathy in humans, pronounced tremor of the hands or other parts of the body can be observed at separate intervals.
- The reaction of the body to drugs. Some medications can increase the convulsive activity of the nervous system. Such drugs are antidepressants, some adaptogens (Rhodiola rosea, ginseng extracts, golden root, lemongrass, eleutherococcus), lithium preparations, some antipsychotics, aminophylline.
- Hand tremors can be caused by drinking too strong coffee or tea, smoking strong cigarettes.
- The use of certain drugs, such as amphetamine, also causes a characteristic tremor in the hands.
The causes of hand tremor in adults can be very different.
The most pronounced examples of such a pathology in healthy people can be chills during hypothermia or after hard physical work.
It is very important that all these varieties of physiological tremor have a certain external factor, if it is excluded, this condition should disappear. A specialist should be consulted only in cases where hand shake does not disappear within two weeks after optimizing your lifestyle.
The causes, treatment and symptoms of essential hand tremor are presented below.
Diseases
Pathological tremor of the upper extremities may indicate intoxication of the body, usually occurring during poisoning or strong nervous excitement. This phenomenon can also occur in the presence of endocrine diseases. Common causes of hand tremor are the following diseases:
- Poisoning, in particular, lead, strychnine, carbon monoxide.
- Cases of chronic alcoholism and withdrawal syndromes.
- Severe hand tremor is caused by hypoglycemia, which occurs with an insulin-dependent type of diabetes.
- Thyrotoxicosis and certain pathologies of the adrenal glands can also provoke prolonged tremor of the hands.
- Chronic liver failure, with severe manifestations of jaundice in some fulminant varieties of viral hepatitis. In this case, the so-called “clapping” tremor may develop, when the hands tremble even in a state of absolute calm.
- The defeat of certain parts of the brain: cerebellum, extrapyramidal nuclei, trunk, which causes, as a rule, persistent tremor, as well as with other extrapyramidal disorders. Hand shake in case of systemic damage to the cerebellum is called "intentional": hand tremor intensifies when trying to reach a certain object.
- Family forms of pathology, which are caused, as a rule, by a hereditary predisposition.
- Alzheimer's disease is a common cause of hand tremor in older people.
- Parkinson's disease.
- Senile dementia.
- Wilson's disease - Konovalov.
- Multiple sclerosis, as well as other demyelinating pathologies (for example, acute encephalomyelitis).
- Progressive varieties of tick-borne encephalitis, chronic encephalomyelitis.
- Anemia, including hereditary, as well as conditions that may be associated with chronic hypoxemia: parasitic infections, hemorrhoid loss, chronic gastric ulcer, ulcerative colitis, female diseases.
The causes of hand tremor are not fully understood. A separate form is the so-called “essential” tremor, which is sometimes of a family nature, however, no disturbances in the functioning of other body systems are determined. Hence the name - “essential”, which means “trembling for unknown reasons”.
Difficult problem
By describing some of the causes of essential hand tremor, it becomes clear that such a problem of trembling of the upper extremities is very complex, and specialists should approach it very carefully. There is an unhealthy practice when, without understanding, the doctor immediately puts the patient, especially the elderly, the diagnosis of Parkinson’s disease and sends him to the institution of extrapyramidal pathology. Then it turns out that the person does not have this disease. Therefore, this problem of the timely diagnosis of tremor is very acute before the doctors of modern clinics.
The causes of hand tremor should be established by a qualified specialist.
The degree of tremor of the upper limbs
All manifestations of hand tremors are classified by severity, because sometimes this can serve as a reason for transferring the patient to disability, due to disability. A similar phenomenon is divided into:
- Slight tremor that appears at certain points in time. They can be much shorter than those in which the person’s hands do not tremble. Tremor of this category does not affect the patient’s lifestyle and quality.
- Moderate hand tremor, when a person is forced to change the nature of activity, since he can not control the accuracy of movements.
- Significant tremor, when the patient has difficulty in basic self-care, cannot bring a glass of water to his mouth, for example. Such patients are prohibited from using sharp cutlery. They find it difficult, for example, to turn over the pages of a book while reading, etc. It is also very difficult for such patients to work at a computer. A similar trembling of the upper extremities occurs in some forms of multiple sclerosis, when cerebellar damage occurs, with encephalitis and hepatocerebral dystrophy. The causes and treatment of hand tremor are interconnected.
In childhood
Hand tremor in healthy children is a temporary phenomenon. It can occur when the nervous system is underdeveloped, as well as its inability to transmit or receive impulses, which is due to incomplete maturation of peripheral nerves. A similar type of disturbance appears, as a rule, against the background of emotional changes and the active production of adrenaline. This symptomatology is the first sign that there is an active muscle contraction and increased utilization of oxygen and glucose by muscle tissues. In response to such processes, muscles, as a rule, react with characteristic trembling.
In such situations, when contacting a doctor, it is necessary to notify him of all critical periods of intrauterine development, if any, as well as all diseases that occurred during the period of gestation, fetal hypoxia, fetoplacental insufficiency, etc.
Other causes of hand tremor in a child may be perinatal injuries, prematurity, congenital forms of diabetes mellitus, threats of abortion, congenital syphilis or rapid delivery.
Under normal conditions of development of the child, hand tremor usually disappears after reaching the age of 12 months. If hand tremor occurs later, you should consult a pediatrician.
Hand tremor in alcoholism
Another cause of hand tremor in adults.
A similar phenomenon is not uncommon among people with alcoholism. The reason for this is the effect of ethanol on the body, which has a toxic effect, while affecting the nerve endings. This symptomatology reflects the medical concept of toxic polyneuropathy.
Hand tremor with alcoholism is observed, as a rule, in the morning. This phenomenon is not clearly expressed at the initial stages, tremor in these cases manifests itself from time to time. However, if alcohol dependence is not treated, this symptom will become chronic. It is possible to cure hand tremor in such conditions, however, the patient should refuse to take alcohol.
Essential type tremor
This disease is observed in 3% of young people under the age of 40-45 years, and their number significantly increases in old age. Trembling of the limbs occurs, as a rule, with a frequency of 7-10 times per second. In some cases, tremor of other parts of the body, for example, the head, legs, and vocal cords, joins hand tremor. The causes, treatment, and symptoms of essential hand tremor are of interest to many.
Treatment of a pathological phenomenon
The type of therapy that is used in case of tremor of the upper extremities depends on what type of this phenomenon occurs in each individual case. There is no universal cure for this, as hand shake is caused, as a rule, by certain factors.
The treatment of tremor due to human physiology is the simplest. It is recommended to normalize sleep, relieve emotional stress with the help of traditional medicine or medications with a mild sedative effect. It is also necessary to exclude hard physical work and limit the use of drinks containing caffeine. It is important to give up smoking, often ventilate the room.
Depending on the causes of hand tremor in adults, treatment is selected. The drugs that are shown in this case are tincture of valerian or motherwort, Glycine, Novo-Passit, some antidepressants and tranquilizers.
With hand tremors, it is very useful to use methods of therapeutic fasting or a diet in order to change the physiological muscle tone. In this case, muscle contractions normalize over time.
Of course, if the cause of hand tremor in adults is correctly identified.
Essential Hand Tremor Treatment
The treatment of this type of pathological tremor of the upper extremities is carried out according to other principles than the treatment of physiological forms of tremor. In this case, the following drugs have a good therapeutic effect:
- Beta-blockers, such as Anaprilin, Obzidan, Propranolol, Inderal. The dose is first prescribed in a minimum amount, subsequently increasing it depending on the severity of the pathological process, as well as in accordance with the maximum allowable dosages.
- Antipsychotics, as well as tranquilizers - with a pronounced trembling of the upper limbs.
- Carbonic anhydrase inhibitors, for example, Diacarb.
- High doses of vitamin B 6 are highly effective in progressive hand tremors. The drug should be used in courses that are 1 month, with a break in the same time period.
- Levetiracetam is an anticonvulsant drug that has also proven itself in the treatment of essential hand tremors. The reason may be different.
Parkinson's disease as a cause of hand tremor
In the treatment of estrapyramidal tremor of the upper extremities with pathologies such as Parkinson's disease, the use of the most powerful medications is required, since in this case a systemic effect on the basal nuclei of the brain is necessary. At the same time, these drugs should actively reduce muscle tone. Such medications are:
- "Bromocriptine";
- Memantine;
- Levodopa;
- Amantadine and others.
These medications, unlike those used in the treatment of essential tremor of the hands, have a direct effect on the exchange of mediators in the internal structures of the brain, so these drugs are dispensed in pharmacies strictly according to the prescription, because the independent use of such drugs can lead to serious negative the consequences.
The causes of hand tremor in the elderly are understandable.
Pathological trembling of the upper extremities, partially or completely, can become one of the external manifestations of some serious pathologies in the human body, therefore, one should not neglect the treatment of this phenomenon, and even more so - the use of modern diagnostic methods for the possible detection of other pathologies. If trembling of the upper extremities is not physiological, that is, in cases where it is not caused by cases of nervous overstrain and stress, it is necessary to identify other causes of tremor of the right arm, left or both at once.
Diagnosis of diseases, the symptom of which is hand shake, is to identify the cause of the pathology. The directions of these measures are determined by the doctor in each individual case, taking into account other possible symptoms and manifestations of certain diseases.
We examined the causes and treatment of hand tremor in older people.