Prognosis and epidemiology of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis

Abstract

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis is a disease with highly variable clinical features and prognosis. We analyzed the prognostic indicators of age, sex, bulbar or spinal onset, body mass index (BMI), and forced vital capacity (FVC) for 728 deceased patients from the Emory ALS Clinic. The median overall survival was 29.8 months from symptom onset, 15.8 months from diagnosis, and 14.3 months from the initial clinic visit. While univariate analyses revealed that each of the identified clinical features was strongly associated with patient survival, in multivariable analyses only age, BMI, and FVC measured at the first clinic visit were independent prognostic indicators; bulbar onset and sex were not significantly associated with survival prognosis after adjustment for the other clinical features.