[Long-term prognosis of the patients of myotonic dystrophy with tube feeding].

We studied the long-term prognosis of the patients of myotonic dystrophy with tube feeding. Subjects were 51 patients (31 male patients and 20 female patients) of typical myotonic dystrophy who were at least once admitted in our hospital. We examined the age of the introduction of tube feeding, the cause of the introduction, respiratory and motor ability at the introduction, the duration of tube feeding, the cause of death and the extension of CTG repeats in the patients. Comparing with the patients with tube feeding and the patients without it, we also examined the prognosis after the introduction of tube feeding. Tube feeding was introduced in 13 cases. The mean age of tube feeding was 57.9 +/- 8.3 years old. The mean age of death of non tube feeding group was 55.9 +/- 5.5 years old. These show tube feeding was introduced in more elderly patients. Statstically the tube feeding was effective, but poor prognosis even after the introduction of tube feeding was suggested because the mean survival time after the introduction was about 850 days. We could not find any correlation between the age of the introduction of tube feeding and the extension of CAG report.