The prevalence of carpal tunnel syndrome in egyptian fibromyalgia patients

Abstract EN

Objective: To assess the prevalence of carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS) in fibromyalgia patients (FM).

Materials & Methods: A series of 50 consecutive FM patients were evaluated for the presence of CTS.

Twenty patients had dermatomal parasthesias in the fingers innervated by the median nerve and were evaluated with electromyography and nerve conduction velocity studies (EMG/NCV).

Results: Eight patients showed EMG/NCV findings diagnostic of CTS (16% of the 50 cases, 40% of the 20 EMG studies).

We compared our results with those reported for women in the general population.

The overall prevalence of CTS in women was higher (16% Vs 10.2%) but not statistically different.

However, in our series, there was a clear difference in higher rate of undetected CTS in FM women as compared to that in the general population (14% Vs 6.7%, p<0.01).

Conclusion: CTS is common in FM as in general population, but the rate of undiagnosed CTS in FM women is much higher than the rate reported in the general population.

NCV studies may be necessary to evaluate undiagnosed CTS in FM patients who have dermatomal paresthesias in their hands.