The Ice Bucket Challenge

You probably have seen at least a couple of videos of the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. The videos are basically records of activities which involve dumping a bucket of ice water on someone's head. This is done to promote awareness of the disease called amyotrophic lateral sclerosis while at the same time encouraging more people to donate to its research cause.

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and the spinal cord. Motor neurons reach from the brain to the spinal cord and from the spinal cord to the muscles throughout the body. The progressive degeneration of the motor neurons in ALS eventually leads to their death. When the motor neurons die, the ability of the brain to initiate and control muscle movement is lost. With voluntary muscle action progressively affected, patients in the later stages of the disease may become totally paralyzed.

As motor neurons degenerate, they can no longer send impulses to the muscle fibers that normally result in muscle movement. Early symptoms of ALS often include increasing muscle weakness, especially involving the arms and legs, speech, swallowing or breathing. When muscles no longer receive the messages from the motor neurons that they require to function, the muscles begin to atrophy (become smaller). Limbs begin to look "thinner" as muscle tissue atrophies.

The ALS Ice Bucket Challenge went viral throughout a wide variety of social media platforms (particularly on Facebook) during late July and August of 2014.

There's no cure for the disease as of the moment. The goal of the several groups affiliated with ALS Association is to raise money for research and patient services while at the same time raising awareness.