In the autobiography, Laughing at my Nightmare, the author, Shane Burcaw, is diagnosed with spinal muscular atrophy, and the book deals with Burcaw’s life with spinal muscular atrophy. In order to understand spinal muscular atrophy, one must know the causes, the variations of spinal muscular atrophy, as well as the outlook of the disease. To begin with, one of the key concepts of spinal muscular atrophy is the causes of it. According to WebMD, spinal muscular atrophy is a noncommunicable disease, which means that a person with this ailment cannot infect other people with spinal muscular atrophy due to it being heredity. One can only get spinal muscular atrophy only if both of their parents had copies of a defective gene. Furthermore, if the …show more content…
According to WebMD, the first type of spinal muscular disease is the most serious variant due to the fact that most children with type 1 fail to live past two years of age from breathing issues because the muscles that control breathing are feeble. Symptoms of type 1 include limp arms and legs as well as the trouble swallowing. Moreover, type 2 spinal muscular atrophy occurs with children from six to eighteen months old. According to the National Organization for Rare Diseases, children with type 2 are able to sit on their own, but fail to walk more than 10 feet, however, once they mature to a teenager, they will be unable to sit independently. A symptom common for people diagnosed with type 2 is the fingers quivering (National Organization for Rare Diseases). According to WebMD, type 2 spinal muscular atrophy is also referred to as chronic infantile spinal muscular atrophy. Moving on, type 3, which is also called the Kugelberg-Welander disease, is characterized by having difficulties running, getting out of a chair, and using the stairs form ages two to seventeen. Due to these issues, someone with type 3 spinal muscular atrophy will likely require a wheelchair to move from one location to another. In addition from the same article, type 4 spinal muscular atrophy only impact those with spinal muscular atrophy that are adults. The health problems for type 4 include shuddering, difficulties with breathing