The changing role of pediatric electrodiagnosis

Electrodiagnosis is one of several useful diagnostic tests in infants and children who have anterior horn cell disease, neuropathy, neuromuscular junction disorders, or myopathy. It is also used for intraoperative monitoring in children. For hypotonic infants and for older children with a nonspecific presentation of weakness, EDX may provide direction for more specific diagnostic testing, such as DNA testing with or without muscle biopsy. Genetic testing has an increasingly important role in the diagnosis of children with neuromuscular disorders. Future improvements in motor unit quantitation, which do not require active patient cooperation and require less time than current methodologies, may make EDX more specific and useful for diagnosing neuromuscular disease in children.