Duchenne-Becker+Muscular+Dystrophy


 * **Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD, or DBMD)** is a genetic disorder, mostly in boys, that is inherited from the mutated X chromosome from his mother, it causes progressive muscle weakness as individual muscle cells dies.
 * A small mutation in one gene on the X chromosome __causes__ DMD's progressive muscle wasting.
 * Inside this gene, many separate chunks called **exons** contain instructions for producing an important muscle protein called **dystrophin**. Each exon has to be read in order from start to end to construct the protein properly.
 * Most boys with DMD-- around 75%-- are missing one of these exons. This removes some of the instructions for making muscle protein, and it mixes up the code inside the exons futher along in the gene, stopping any further reading of it.
 * Boys with DMD lose their muscle throughout their lives but it isn't noticed until an unusual walking or running or talking difficulty by the age of 3.


 * About one-third of the time, there is someone else in the family that has DBMD, like a brother, uncle, or cousin. When a boy with DBMD has a relative with the disease, he is said to have “familial” DBMD. But the other two-thirds of the time, the boy is the first one in the family to have DBMD, and is said to have “spontaneous” or “sporadic” DBMD.There are no known risk factors for these spontaneous cases, so a boy with DBMD can be born into any family at any time. Likewise, a girl can be a spontaneous carrier (a female who has one copy of the DBMD mutation and therefore can pass it on to her sons). This means that a girl who is a carrier of DBMD can be born into any family at any time. However, girls rarely have DBMD.


 * It is the most common of the different muscular dystrophies.


 * Early signs include delay in walking, frequent falling, and difficulty getting up from a sitting or lying position. Muscle deterioration continues to progress and, around the time they are 12 years of age, children with DMD become unable to walk.
 * The disease is usually fatal in the teens or early 20s, most commonly due to severe respiratory or heart problems, or both.
 * At this time, there is __no cure__ for DBMD. There are a few treatments that can help slow the progression of muscle loss, such as use of steroids, but there is no cure.
 * At this time, there is __no cure__ for DBMD. There are a few treatments that can help slow the progression of muscle loss, such as use of steroids, but there is no cure.



Because of weakened leg muscles, boys with DMD have a distinctive way of rising from the floor, called Gowers’ maneuver. They first get on hands and knees, then lift the posterior, then “walk” their hands up the legs to raise the upper body.