Columns

Welcome to “MS News Notes,” a column where I comment on multiple sclerosis (MS) news stories that caught my eye last week. Here’s a look at what’s been happening: Dalfampridine side effects The side effects that might occur if you use dalfampridine (sold under the brand name Ampyra)…

I’m back in my happy place. My wife, Laura, and I, along with our Yorkie-poo and our Maine Coon cat, have made it back to our Florida home after 16 hours and about 1,000 miles of driving over two days. There were no traffic jams, we had a comfortable motel…

Halloween is five days away, and if you have kids, you’re running out of time to have your costumes ready. My wife and our three boys have everything figured out, minus some finishing touches — unless I want to dress up, of course. Fortunately, I wasn’t planning on it because…

Multiple Sclerosis News Today is chronicling MS advocate and podcaster Mike Parker’s journey, leading up to a skydiving jump he’ll make Oct. 29 to benefit the MS Society U.K. Learn more about Mike at mikesmsjourney.com. You can also donate to his fundraiser.  Third in a…

Welcome to “MS News Notes,” a column where I comment on multiple sclerosis (MS) news stories that caught my eye last week. This week, the stories cover research presented at the joint meeting of the European Committee for Treatment and Research in Multiple Sclerosis (ECTRIMS) and the…

A few columns back, I wrote about my lack of time to get anything done. Sure, the way around it would be to get up infernally early — well, early for me. But I’m most certainly not going to pay to be punished. And that’s the story I’ve always…

“I’m so tiredThe hammer’s coming down againI’m hardwiredAll the signals cross and double backBroken insideThere’s no fixing anythingHow do i explainI’m fighting every day to do the simple things?” The lyrics to “Hammer,” written by singer Susie Ulrey and the band Pohgoh,…

I try not to let my life revolve around multiple sclerosis (MS), but there’s no escaping the fact that the disease affects every part of it. That’s a bit of a conundrum and often frustrates me to no end. If there’s a bright side to be found, it’s that…

Multiple Sclerosis News Today is chronicling MS advocate and podcaster Mike Parker’s journey leading up to a skydiving jump he’ll be making Oct. 29 to benefit the MS Society U.K. Learn more about Mike at mikesmsjourney.com. You can also donate to his fundraiser.  Second in…

Welcome to “MS News Notes,” a column where I comment on multiple sclerosis (MS) news stories that caught my eye last week. This week, the stories cover research presented at the joint meeting of the European Committee for Treatment and Research in Multiple Sclerosis (ECTRIMS) and the…

About a month ago, I embarked on what might have been my last-ever solo outing. You can file it away with my other lasts: sitting down and getting off the sofa on my own, walking without mobility aids, doing a controlled Frankenstein’s monster stumble into my bedroom, putting myself to…

My mobility scooter died last week. I can walk 100 feet or so using a pair of canes, but my wheels are usually my legs. So when I turned the key and discovered those “legs” were powerless, I was in a bind. This breakdown couldn’t have happened at a worse…

With my kids in school, me being retired, and, of course, the limitations of my multiple sclerosis (MS), I have a lot of free time on my hands. I’d like to say that I always use it productively, but that’s far from the truth. I putter — if you…

Multiple Sclerosis News Today is chronicling MS advocate and podcaster Mike Parker’s journey leading up to a skydiving jump he’ll be making on Oct. 29 to benefit the MS Society U.K. Learn more about Mike at his website mikesmsjourney.com and click here to donate to his fundraiser.

Welcome to “MS News Notes,” a column where I comment on multiple sclerosis (MS) news stories that caught my eye last week. Here’s a look at what’s been happening: ‘Silent’ MS progression Readers of the MS News Today website and Facebook page sometimes wonder why their MS…

The original title for this week’s column wasn’t so much of a headline, but more of an essay. I had to shorten it. I’d also better write a bit more here so that my opening paragraph is a tad longer. Ah, being all meta about it has saved my vegan…

You’d think that people with multiple sclerosis (MS) and other disabilities would have easy access to healthcare services. That’s not always so. A small study in the journal Health Affairs that I wrote about last year said many physicians “expressed explicit bias toward people with disabilities and described…

Back in spring, I wrote about the fatigue that accompanies multiple sclerosis (MS) and how difficult it was to describe and for others to understand. That’s true, of course, but really, the entirety of MS is difficult to explain. Factor in the variety of symptoms and the…

Welcome to “MS News Notes,” a column where I comment on multiple sclerosis (MS) news stories that caught my eye last week. Here’s a look at what’s been happening: Stem cell transplant found to be safe, effective in recent study Autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplant (aHSCT) has been…

I haven’t seen my mate Nige for years. Actually, to his face I call him Nigel, but it’s Nige when I, or anyone else, talk about him in the third person. It’s weird — I’d never thought about that before typing his name just now. And it’s not like he…

My wife and I got the latest COVID-19 vaccine the other day, the first of three vaccines we’ll be getting this fall. The others are the seasonal flu vaccine and the respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) vaccine. This was my sixth COVID-19 vaccine, and I’ve received a…

I ask a lot of questions. I have to, because I’ve come to realize that I don’t actually know that much. Asking questions (even to myself) is the only solution. Oddly enough, though, learning new things doesn’t completely scratch my itch, as the answers just keep showing me how much…

Welcome to “MS News Notes,” a column where I comment on multiple sclerosis (MS) news stories that caught my eye last week. Here’s a look at what’s been happening: An ‘inverse vaccine’ trial to treat MS What’s an “inverse vaccine,” you might ask? While traditional vaccines rev up…

Big breath, for my travails below necessitate a catch-up on my story so far. For once, my multiple sclerosis and the myriad joyous comorbidities it’s conferred on me — trigeminal neuralgia, lymphedema, diplopia, spasticity — have given me a break. So have the fellow travelers who’ve…

A question that’s been bothering me lately is this: It seems that more than a few neurologists have a less than optimal understanding of multiple sclerosis (MS). Why is that?  In my four decades of living with MS, and during the several years I’ve written this column…

I’ve never been one to worry too much about what my purpose in life is. It’s not that I’m incapable of being philosophical, or that I was ever too egotistical to think I needed one. I suppose I just thought that if I had a purpose, it’d work…

Welcome to “MS News Notes,” a column where I comment on multiple sclerosis (MS) news stories that caught my eye last week. Here’s a look at what’s been happening: Vaccines pose no unusual risk of MS hospitalization, study says It’s time for me to get my seasonal flu shot,…

How do you start a column about depression that isn’t, well, depressing? That’s a question for me to answer rather than you lot. If you’re still reading this week’s musings, then so far I’ve done pretty darned good. It was a confluence of events that fortunately involved water. I’d…

Lightning struck at 3 a.m. the other night. The alarm system in my apartment blared — beep, beep, beep — for hours. The dog was barking, the cat was zooming, and I wasn’t sleeping. My stress meter was off the scale. We know that stress can trigger of…

Note: This column was updated Sept. 12, 2023, to correct that Octave’s MSDA blood test is currently available and in use throughout the U.S. Welcome to “MS News Notes,” a column where I comment on multiple sclerosis (MS) news stories that caught my eye last week. Here’s a look…