Tremors and its determinants: a 7-years study at a secondary care hospital.

OBJECTIVE To evaluate the cause, frequency and determinants of tremors at secondary care settings. METHODS A hospital based cross-sectional study for seven years (2002-2009) was carried out at Sindh Govt. Hospital (SGH) Liaqatabad No.10, Karachi. Sample size was 403 and sampling technique was Convenience sampling. A data collection form was designed and all essential variables were recorded regarding age, gender, residence, complaints and their duration, education status, profession, co-morbid and investigations performed. The results were analyzed using SPSS 16.0. RESULTS Out of 403 patients 247 (61.5%) were males and 156 (38.5 %) were females. The mean age of the patients was 55.9 +/- 14.2 years. The male to female ratio was 2: 1.6. Enhanced physiological tremor was the most frequent diagnosis. Among whom, females of 40-60 years were mostly affected. Essential tremors were mainly coarse in amplitude, whereas commonest fine tremors were diagnosed as Enhanced Physiological tremor. CONCLUSION Evaluation of patients with tremors showed males to be more affected with essential tremors being the commonest encountered. Orthostatic tremor was rare. Essential tremors were diagnosed by exclusion.