muscular dystrophyn.
/ˌmʌskjᵿlə ˈdɪstrəfi/, U.S. /ˈˌməskjələr ˈdɪstrəfi/ Medicine.
Any of a group of heritable (often sex-linked) disorders characterized by progressive weakness and wasting of skeletal muscles, sometimes with abnormalities of cardiac muscle or other organ systems; these disorders collectively.Muscular dystrophy is distinguished from atrophy as originating in the muscle tissue itself, rather than in the nervous system, and in tending to affect the larger muscles first.
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muscular dystrophy1886
1886 W. R. Gowers Man. Dis. Nerv. Syst. I. iii. 386 Idiopathic Muscular Atrophy..Muscular Dystrophy.
1932 W. Boyd Text-bk. Pathol. xxx. 840 The muscular dystrophies have several clinical divisions, but the basic pathology is the same... The large muscles concerned with fixation (shoulder, girdle, hip) are chiefly affected, the small muscles concerned with active movement (hand, etc.) usually escaping. This is the opposite to what occurs in progressive muscular atrophy.
1961 R. D. Baker Essent. Pathol. xi. 275 In muscular dystrophy the atrophy is due to changes in the muscle fibers themselves... In muscular atrophy the primary change is in the nerves which supply the muscles or in the cord or brain.
1994 Canada Lutheran Aug. 20/4 The daycare children became ‘national champs’ in their category after raising $5,000 for muscular dystrophy.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, March 2003; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1886