February 13, 2024 News by Lindsey Shapiro, PhD Nitric oxide metabolites in blood could aid diagnosis of MS: Study Measuring levels of nitric oxide metabolites in the blood could be a diagnostic biomarker for multiple sclerosis (MS), recent research suggests. The molecules, collectively called NOx, were elevated in the blood of people with relapsing-remitting MS (RRMS) and primary-progressive MS…
January 24, 2024 News by Andrea Lobo, PhD Healthcare utilization increases in the year before MS diagnosis: Study People with multiple sclerosis (MS) utilize more healthcare resources a year before their MS diagnosis, suggesting this may be a period of prodromal MS, when patients start having unspecific and mild MS symptoms. These might include mild cognitive issues, skin problems, and anemia, when the body doesn’t have…
November 29, 2023 Columns by Mike Parker How I kept going after a discouraging diagnosis of MS Let me introduce myself: I’m Mike, and if you don’t mind, I’d like to share my story. I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS) in August 2022. Since then, a lot has changed, including the loss of a 20-year career, worsening mobility problems, and the start of…
November 10, 2023 News by Marisa Wexler, MS CSF protein levels at diagnosis may help predict MS long-term outcomes Levels of proteins in the liquid that surrounds the brain and spinal cord, called the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), can help predict disease activity and disability worsening for people with multiple sclerosis (MS), a study reports. “We identified several promising protein biomarkers which could be used to predict short-term activity…
October 19, 2023 Columns by Benjamin Hofmeister With a diagnosis of MS, you learn to expect the unexpected 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…
October 18, 2023 Columns by Mike Parker Dragged into my MS diagnosis, but now jumping for a cure: Part 2 Multiple Sclerosis News Today is chronicling MS advocate and podcaster Mike Parkerās journey leading up to a skydiving jump heāll 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.Ā Second in…
September 13, 2023 News by Lindsey Shapiro, PhD Disability after RRMS diagnosis may predict transition to SPMS Greater self-reported physical disability within the first years of being diagnosed with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis (MS) is associated with a higher likelihood of transitioning to a progressive form of the disease. The finding comes from a recent analysis of patient-reported data from the U.K. MS Register. Scientists believe the…
August 31, 2023 Columns by Benjamin Hofmeister With multiple sclerosis, hindsight is accurate āĀ and often unkind “Being diagnosed later in life is like watching a TV show with a huge plot twist revealed at the end of the season and then rewatching it with this new knowledge, picking up on all the foreshadowing and getting upset that you didn’t see all of it before.” ā…
August 29, 2023 News by Marisa Wexler, MS Diagnosing primary progressive MS difficult, despite guidelines DiagnosingĀ primary progressive multiple sclerosis (PPMS) can be challenging, with obstacles ranging from ruling out other disorders to differentiating between PPMS and other types of multiple sclerosis (MS). These difficulties were highlighted in the study, “Real-world challenges in the diagnosis of primary progressive multiple sclerosis,” published…
August 11, 2023 Columns by John Connor What I should’ve been told about clinically isolated syndrome and MS In 2007, at age 47, I had my first-ever consultation with a neurologist. It was during my longest-ever hospital stay, as of then ā a whopping eight days. It amazed me that some of my fellow patients in the ward managed to gather themselves and struggle outside for a ciggy,…
May 5, 2023 Columns by Ed Tobias Artificial intelligence moves into the MS exam room. But should it? Is artificial intelligence (AI) intelligent enough to help make a diagnosis of multiple sclerosis (MS)? Apparently so, and more. In the United Kingdom, a project named AssistMS is studying whether AI can be used to detect and highlight changes on brain MRIs. An algorithm software called…
March 30, 2023 Columns by Benjamin Hofmeister There’s no point in playing the blame game after the disease is diagnosed In a previous column, I wrote about the journey to my diagnosis of multiple sclerosis (MS). In it, I mentioned that the neurologist had praised me for “taking this well.” I suppose I did ā at first. When I eliminated the other possibilities, I was left with an…
November 3, 2022 News by Lindsey Shapiro, PhD #ECTRIMS2022 ā Job Prospects Can Slowly Take a Hit After CIS Diagnosis In the years after a diagnosis of clinically isolated syndrome (CIS) ā a first episode of neurological symptoms suggestive of multiple sclerosis (MS) ā the odds of maintaining employment progressively decrease, according to a recent study. The risk of decreasing or losing employment was particularly high among individuals…
October 7, 2022 Columns by John Connor No Surprise Here: Reflections and Ruminations on Living With MS There are moments in life that have surprising effects on us. I’ve had two. The first was when I was about 9, and my mother informed me that my headmaster had been told I’d disappeared after school. Fair enough in hindsight. I presume sheād phoned the police as well, but…
August 23, 2022 Columns by Jamie Hughes Itās OK Not to Be OK: What to Do When You Feel Stuck in a Rut For the last few months, Iāve been mired in something I can only describe as a funk. My job, my family, my faith, my entire life ā no matter what aspect weāre talking about, I felt like I was stuck. I mean like soul-in-a-straitjacket stuck. Honestly, I hadnāt felt anything…
August 18, 2022 News by Margarida Maia, PhD Eye Scans May Help to Diagnose MS in Children A machine learning approach based on eye scans was employed by researchers to diagnose multiple sclerosis (MS) in children with up to 80% accuracy. Optical coherence tomography (OCT) scans also provided enough data to diagnose other demyelinating diseases with 75% accuracy. OCT is an imaging tool that uses…
August 16, 2022 News by Margarida Maia, PhD RRMS Onset Taking Place at Older Ages Over Past 50 Years The first symptoms of relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis (RRMS) have been appearing increasingly later in life, according to a Spanish study covering nearly five decades. From the 1970s through the 2010s, the average age at disease onset rose by more than 10 years in both men and women, its researchers…
August 11, 2022 Columns by Stephen De Marzo High Temperatures Make My Brain Become Strangled in Static AM radio is infamous for bad reception, resulting in nothing but static. You can search the dial frequency by frequency, and itās all static. Occasionally you will cross a station, but then the car moves, and the reception is lost again. When I’m overwhelmed with the heat, that’s what…
August 4, 2022 Columns by Benjamin Hofmeister How My MS Diagnosis Journey Became My Origin Story If I were a superhero (or a supervillain, for that matter), Iād have an origin story. As it stands, Iām not even a minor hero in real life, and only a mediocre one when appearing in my own stories. Iām just a guy with multiple sclerosis, and all I…
August 1, 2022 News by Hawken Miller Project Aims to ‘Bridge the Gap’ in Care Disparities for Latinos With MS When Sarah Garcia was diagnosed with the relapsing-remitting form of multiple sclerosis (MS) at age 13, she didnāt know any other young Latino women with the neurodegenerative disorder. Garcia grew up in a tight-knit Hispanic community in Socorro, Texas, near El Paso. Most of her doctors were white,…
July 29, 2022 Columns by Ed Tobias Dreams, Diagnoses, and Disclosures: When to Tell Others About MS The other night I dreamed I was standing in a military formation when my leg began to twitch with an MS spasm. I couldn’t stay in line. The top sergeant yelled while the other soldiers laughed. Suddenly, the scene shifted to a balance beam, where I desperately tried to…
July 28, 2022 Columns by Stephen De Marzo The Heat Is On: Coping With PPMS and High Temperatures Oh, brother, itās hot! How hot? Well, my thermometer hit āare you kidding meā levels. My experience with primary progressive multiple sclerosis (PPMS) has taught me that an 0.5-degree rise in body temperature is enough to cause a shutdown. Allow me to explain what itās like when my…
July 22, 2022 News by Mary Chapman Degree Deodorant Gives 3 Runners Second Chance to Finish Marathon Degree Deodorant wants people to have the confidence to persevere in the face of obstacles or self doubt. To that end, the leading antiperspirant company is introducing its Not Done Yet Marathon Team, composed of individuals, including a multiple sclerosis (MS) patient, who did not finish their marathon.
June 17, 2022 Columns by Ed Tobias She Disclosed Her Illness and Got the Job It’s a decision most of us with a chronic illness have to make sooner or later: When do we disclose our illness, and to whom, and how do we do it? Thirty-one-year-old Katie Coleman faced that decision not long ago. Coleman has stage 4 kidney cancer, and, in April, she…
June 16, 2022 Columns by Stephen De Marzo The Journey Toward My Primary Progressive MS Diagnosis When I turned 50 in 2013, I blew out the candles, and bam! I was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes. I started seeing an endocrinologist and a neurologist, taking daily diabetic medications, and testing my blood sugar every day. At that point, I was not physically disabled in any…
May 26, 2022 News by Marisa Wexler, MS Lesions in 3 Brain Regions Can Help Distinguish MS From Like Disorders People with multiple sclerosis (MS) are more likely to have lesions in three regions of the brain ā the anterior temporal horn, periventricular region, and cerebellar hemisphere ā compared with people with other inflammatory brain diseases, a study reports. Looking for lesions in these parts of the brain may…
May 4, 2022 Columns by Beth Ullah Recovering My Self-esteem After Adapting to MS-related Incontinence Without hesitation, I would say that my bladder and bowel issues have been the hardest symptoms to manage and overcome following myĀ MS diagnosis. It comes down to one thing: the fear of having an accident in public.
April 22, 2022 Columns by Jamie Hughes An Interview With Writer Edith Forbes: Living With MS Last year, I got the chance to read and review Edith Forbesā medical memoir, “Tracking a Shadow.” I thought it was an encouraging and thoughtful work, so I contacted her by email for an interview to share her thoughts with readers of this column. Forbes graduated from Stanford…
April 15, 2022 Columns by Ed Tobias Upon Reflection, I’m Determined to Seize the Day Do you think about death? I do ā a lot. I mean, like almost every day. Don’t get…
April 8, 2022 News by Lindsey Shapiro, PhD MS Patients May Meet Criteria for Sjƶgrenās Diagnosis, Study Reports Symptoms of Sjƶgrenās syndrome, including dry eyes and mouth, were observed among 16 people with multiple sclerosis (MS), three of whom met the diagnostic criteria for Sjƶgrenās in a recent study. Given this low number, however, it’s unclear if there is a true association between the two diseases,…