Anyone medical here who can help me decipher this?

[Nine1224]

Went to GP with neurological symptoms. Right sided weakness, tingling, that kind of thing.

Saw neurologist privately, graded my reflexes as being between 1+ and 2+ with mute plantars. He's referred me to himself on the NHS. He's planning an MRI and told me he just wanted to rule out any issues.

He's now sent a separate letter to my GP stating the same but that I have high reflexes and he suspects a possible upper motor lesion.

Feeling anxious that he didn't explain any of this to me and now I'm wondering if I have high or normal reflexes as the letter is contradictory.

Is it more complex than this? Might he have omitted some information from the initial letter to me as not to worry me? Just can't work out how my reflexes can all be 1+/2+ but also be 'high'.

I am sorry you’re going through this, but if you’ve gone so far as to have paid for medical advice, then there’s not going to be anything faster, superior, or better for you on the AIBU forum of Mumsnet that will clarify this.

Hi. I do realise this (just very anxious). I'm wondering why medical professionals might omit/write contradictory information in two letters. Still likely to be a few weeks until scan and probably a few more weeks after that until I have the results.

I agree with @JacquesHarlow ; you may get lots of posters giving ‘advice’ or anecdotes, but unless there is a neurologist passing through, they are unlikely to help. It’s so hard waiting, I know.

How’s about calling the secretary and asking for clarification. You’re paying for this so it should be done info you can make sense of.

Get in touch with your GP and ask for clarification. It may well be something and nothing to those who know about all things neurological, but you'll probably only get conflicting and potentially more not completely accurate information on here which may add to your anxiety.

Please keep us posted.

In my experience private doctors sometimes exaggerate a bit when referring to the NHS because they know which key words will move a referral more quickly through the queue. But agree the best thing to do is contact him directly to ask.

I would use 1+ for a normal reflex and 2+ or more if it was brisker which would be associated with an upper motor neurone lesion

Power is graded out of 5 so 5/5 normal 1/5 virtually no movement.

So 2+ is different from 2/5? Annoyingly I only paid for the initial consultation so not sure who to contact!

are you a neurologist? that's a different reflex grading to what a lot of us use... be useful to know if things have changed!

If you need medical advice, best to contact medics and not random posters on MN. 🙂