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Post-Polio
Post-polio syndrome, a condition that affects some polio survivors many years after recovery from an initial acute attack of poliovirus, can cause symptoms such as:
- New muscle pain
- Worsening of existing weakness
- New weakness or paralysis.
Post-polio syndrome is not an infectious disease, and people who are experiencing it do not shed the virus.
The severity of post-polio syndrome will depend on the degree of the weakness and disability that remained after a person's original polio attack. For example, someone who had only minimal polio symptoms from the original attack and subsequently develops post-polio syndrome will most likely experience only mild symptoms.
(For more details on this condition, including a list of medical conditions that will be ruled out when making a diagnosis, click Post-Polio Syndrome.)
Written by/reviewed by: Arthur Schoenstadt, MD
Last reviewed by: Arthur Schoenstadt, MD