ClinVar

Description

We examined a family - two daughters and mother. Elder daughter and the mother both have Arg894* variant. Elder daughter is toe-walker. It is not known about the mother whether she had toe-walking in childhood. Younger daughter doesn't have this variant and she is not toe-walker. In the ClinVar database, it is mostly classified as likely pathogenic; 12 entries as pathogenic or probably pathogenic compared to 1 entry as VUS. The variant is described in the literature as causing myotonia congenita of the Thomsen type (autosomal dominant inherited form) and also of the Becker type (autosomal recessive inheritance) [Meyer-Kleine (1995) Am J Hum Genet 57: 1325, Zielonka (2012 ) Neuromuscul Disord 22: 355 and Tincheva (2016) Neuromuscul Disord 26: 675]. Through in-vitro analyzes it could be shown that the detected variant has a dominant-negative effect on the function of the chloride channel [Meyer-Kleine (1995) Am J Hum Genet 57: 1325], which is why c. 2680C> T p. (Arg894 *) both autosomal dominant and recessive inheritance are possible [Pusch (2002) Hum Courage 19: 423]. Myopathy refers to diseases that affect skeletal Muscles. These diseases attack muscle fibers, making muscles weak. Inherited myopathies are often caused by inheriting an abnormal gene mutation from a parent that causes the disease. Symptoms of congenital myopathies usually start at birth or in early childhood, but may not appear until the teen years or even later in adulthood. Congenital myopathies are somewhat unique compared with other inherited myopathies, as weakness typically affects all muscles and is often not progressive. Symptoms are: Muscle weakness, most commonly of upper arms and shoulders and thighs, muscle cramps, stiffness and spasms, fatigue with exertion and lack of energy. Our patients all walk on tiptoe, so they show similar symptoms. When we genetically test them with our toe walking panel, we find that around 90 per cent of them have a genetic variant that explains their toe walking. These can be assigned, for example, to the area of myopathies (such as variants of the COL6A3 gene), the area of hereditary neuropathies (such as variants of the KMT2C gene) or the area of metabolic diseases (such as variants of the PYGM gene). In a smaller group of patients with almost identical symptoms, no abnormality is found in the genes of our panel, but spastic paraplegia can be detected. In another small group of our toe walkers, no abnormalities can be detected in the genes analysed in our toe walking panel, nor do they suffer from spastic paraplegia, as is also the case with healthy children. In contrast to these, however, they show a tiptoe gait. These patients suffer from infantile cerebral palsy, in which toe walking can also be observed.