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Nerve Damage Symptoms

Damage of the nerves can cause serious symptoms that can be debilitating. Within the body are housed three nerves; autonomic, motor, and sensory. Autonomic nerves regulate your heart, blood pressure, body temperature and digestion. Motor nerves regulate your brain and spinal cord. Sensory nerves deal with sensory information within the skin and muscles. Depending on the location of nerve damage, there can be a wide range of symptoms.

  1. Autonomic

    • If damage is done to your autonomic nerves, you can experience bloating, visual disturbances (blurring of your eyes), constipation or diarrhea, the inability to sweat, or profuse sweating. Serious symptoms can include the inability to sense when you are having chest pain. You might also trip over your own feet or have difficulty walking properly.

    More Autonomic Symptoms

    • Some people experience what is known as a syncope episode, or fainting. Dizziness can also happen when blood pressure decreases rapidly. You might also have difficulty in urinating (you feel the urge, but are unable to urinate). You might also experience incontinence, weight loss, nausea/vomiting after eating, male impotence and dry mouth.

    Motor

    • Motor nerve damage can result in the muscles' inability to function properly. They can become weak, lose flexibility, or you can lose muscle mass. You might also experience a loss in muscle control. Breathing sometimes becomes labored and swallowing can become difficult. Buttoning a shirt is difficult, because your hands might twitch when trying to button your shirt.

    More Motor Symptoms

    • Serious symptoms can result in paralysis of extremities. You can also experience the inability to move parts of your body. Sometimes your muscles may twitch (fasciculation) or cramp (like having a Charlie horse). In some cases muscle atrophy can also occur.

    Sensory

    • Sometimes when experiencing sensory nerve damage, it feels as if your limbs have fallen asleep. You might feel a pins and needle type sensation that will not go away. Or, if someone touches you, it can be excruciating. In rare cases, it might feel as if you're wearing a glove over your hands. You might also feel burning/cooling sensations. In many cases, diabetes is the culprit for sensory nerve damage.

    Nerve Damage

    • Nerve damage can be caused by many factors, such as cancer, diabetes, trauma, infectious diseases, or drug interactions. You can experience a range of symptoms because damage was done to more than one nerve. If you experience a host of symptoms, speak with a medical professional to get a proper diagnosis.

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