Spinal Muscular Atrophy

The Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA) topic includes research on the genetics, diagnosis, and treatment of spinal muscular atrophy.

Spinal muscular atrophy is a group of inherited disorders that cause progressive muscle degeneration and weakness. It is usually inherited as an autosomal recessive trait; that is, a person must get the defective gene from both parents to be affected. SMA commonly affects children before age 1 and adults after age 30.