Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis or Lou Gehrig’s disease is a motor neuron disease. It can prove quite fatal, as it happens to be a neurodegenerative disease which happens when the motor neurons, or the nerve cells present in your central nervous system, start degenerating. These are the very cells that control your voluntary muscle movement. Lou Gehrig, a famous baseball player from New York Yankees, was diagnosed with this particular disease in the year 1939 and hence, this disease was named after him.

In 95% of the cases, Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis or ALS is found to be hereditary. In about 20% of these cases, studies observed a genetic defect related to chromosome 21, also called SOD1. Extended Exposure to BMAA, which is actually a dietary neurotoxin that is found in the seed of a particular plant that grows in Guam, is said to be one of the causes of ALS. Other than these, there are no other known causes for this dreadful disease to occur.

Weak Muscles and atrophy are probably the strongest symptoms of this fatal disease. The first muscles that are likely to be affected are probably your swallowing muscles and your breathing muscles. Slowly, as the disease progresses, your other muscles start weakening too. Difficulty in breathing, swallowing difficulties such as choking, gagging and drooling, head dropping because of weaker neck muscles, muscle cramps, fasciculations or muscle contractions, muscle weaknesses that can cause difficulty while walking, while climbing stairs and while lifting, paralysis, slow or slurred speech, hoarseness in voice and loss of weight are the main symptoms associated with ALS or Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

The complications associated with Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis include lung failure, aspiration or breathing in fluid or food, pneumonia, functional disability, pressure sores and weight loss. 75% of the ALS cases succumb to death within 3 to 5 years of being diagnosed with this fatal disease and 25% live longer than the post diagnosis period of 5 years.

If you are a sufferer of ALS, you should contact the CDC or the Canadian disability corporation. This center is known to offer valuable services to disabled people and give them the benefits that they deserve. You will have to fill out a form that is available online on their website, with all details pertaining to your condition, to see whether you qualify to get disability tax credits. Once your application is accepted, a qualified professional from the Canadian Disability Corporation will conduct a research on all the disability tax credits that you are eligible for and will advise and teach you on how you can apply for these tax credits.