What are the types of Muscular Dystrophy?
Muscular dystrophy is a group of inherited diseases that are characterized by weakness and wasting away of muscle tissue, with or without the breakdown of nerve tissue. There are nine types of muscular dystrophy, but in each type there is an eventual loss of strength, increasing disability, and possible deformity. The most well known of the muscular dystrophies is Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), followed by Becker muscular dystrophy (BMD). They cause similar patterns of weakness and disability and are inherited in the same way, although weakness and disability are more severe in DMD. Becker dystrophy is often classified as a less severe form of Duchenne dystrophy. They both are due to defects of the same gene, the normal function of which is to enable muscle fibers to make a particular chemical substance, a protein called dystrophin. Muscle fibers in people affected with DMD are extremely deficient in dystrophin, but in BMD the deficiency is less severe. Listed below are the nine di
