Almost 17% of Spanish children suffers from ICT.

– experts confirm this: tics are not a rare or very rare disorder. The second study in Spain to date, and the first large-scale, reveals the prevalence of 16,86% of these motor disorders in the child population. The incidence is higher in boys than in girls, and they often disappear or decrease with age

Spain, 2011-September tics are a very common disorder ”, explained Esther cube, researcher at the General Yagüe Hospital of Burgos and lead author of a new epidemiological work on tics.

Previously it was believed that it was a rare disorder, and as only studied in patients who consulted for this reason, only saw severe tics. It has now been mostly mild disorders have no functional impact ”, says cube.

Although there have been different epidemiological studies, this is the second is Spain and has a population larger than the first, and only recorded data of two schools.

This work determined the prevalence of disorders of tic in a sample of 1,158 students in the province of Burgos, although the figures are according to the authors, extrapolated to the rest of the Spanish population.

The results, published in the Journal Pediatric Neurology, reveal that while in ordinary schools 16,86% of students had tics, the number amounted to % 20,37 in special education centres. In both cases it was more common in boys than in girls.

Tics are more common in boys than in girls and tend to decrease with the passage of the years

The experts also discussed the existence of other associated disorders such as attention deficit disorder. Tics fluctuate and increase in a context of stress, such as the family or school problems. The most serious diagnoses were (6.07%) chronic motor tics and Tourette’s syndrome (5.26%).

Epidemiological studies indicate that, as they go through the years, if they don’t disappear, they diminish in intensity and frequency. Disorders who have ICT among its symptoms are syndrome of phonic chronic disorders, transient tics, Tourette, unspecified tics.

Although the cause is still unknown, experts point out that this is a disorder of abolition of involuntary movement in the circuit between the basal ganglia and motor cortex. Functional neuroimaging study finds that people with tics there are certain areas of the brain that are sobreactivadas or not correctly activated to suppress these movements or sounds involuntary.