Progressive Multiple Sclerosis
MS Living Well: Key Info from Multiple Sclerosis Experts
Release Date: 02/23/2021
Mind Over MS: Strategies for Staying Positive
MS Living Well: Key Info from Multiple Sclerosis Experts
Facing the first symptoms and a new multiple sclerosis diagnosis can be terrifying, leaving you with a flood of questions about your future. How do you navigate your career, relationships, and whether to start a family? The uncertainty can be overwhelming, but you don’t have to go it alone. Support from loved ones and connections with others living with MS can help light the way. As MS progresses, the mental challenges often intensify. The battle to accept mobility aids—devices that many resist—can feel like a loss, but in reality, they can expand your world. In this episode, we dive...
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Diagnosing Multiple Sclerosis
MS Living Well: Key Info from Multiple Sclerosis Experts
In this era of highly effective treatments, early intervention for multiple sclerosis can be life changing. However, the wide range of initial symptoms often leads to many people being undiagnosed or misdiagnosed, leaving them without the proper care for years. In this podcast episode, we'll discuss the early signs of MS and the key tests, such as specific MRI and spinal fluid results, that are crucial for a timely and accurate diagnosis. Criteria to diagnose MS continues to evolve to help make a diagnosis more swiftly and correctly. Specific MRI findings in the brain and spinal cord can allow...
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MS & The Spinal Cord
MS Living Well: Key Info from Multiple Sclerosis Experts
The spinal cord serves as the main communication highway between the brain and body. Did you know that 80% of people with multiple sclerosis have spinal cord lesions on MRI? These lesions can disrupt specific neural pathways, leading to common MS symptoms like numbness, weakness, impaired coordination, balance issues, bladder problems, constipation, and sexual dysfunction. For instance, damage to the corticospinal tract on one side of the spinal cord can weaken an arm or leg. A remarkable autopsy study revealed that nearly 90% of people with MS still had active inflammation in the spinal cord....
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Uncommon Multiple Sclerosis Symptoms
MS Living Well: Key Info from Multiple Sclerosis Experts
Awareness of the more uncommon multiple sclerosis symptoms can lead to an earlier diagnosis and appropriate treatment. For instance, experiencing electrical shock sensations when bending the neck forward, known as Lhermitte’s sign, may indicate an attack on the cervical spinal cord. Likewise, excruciating bolts of pain across either side of the face, called trigeminal neuralgia, can be caused by a MS relapse. The MS hug, an unfriendly, squeezing sensation around the torso, can respond to muscle relaxants and nerve pain medications. Some MS symptoms, like tingling in legs, only surface when...
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Harnessing AI: Transforming MS Care
MS Living Well: Key Info from Multiple Sclerosis Experts
Prepare to be intrigued by the groundbreaking intersection of artificial intelligence (AI) and multiple sclerosis care! By combing through extensive databases, including genetic information and real patient records, AI can forecast with remarkable accuracy the likelihood of MS onset. In the near future, AI could even serve as a guiding light for clinicians and MS patients in selecting the most suitable disease-modifying therapies, armed with predictive algorithms tailored for each individual. But the marvels of AI don’t stop there. In a recent study, AI detected an astonishing 93% of new and...
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Navigating MS with Other Medical Conditions
MS Living Well: Key Info from Multiple Sclerosis Experts
Living with multiple sclerosis isn't just about managing the condition itself, but often involves navigating a myriad of additional health concerns known as comorbidities. Individuals with MS face a higher risk of experiencing new relapses when dealing with comorbidities like high cholesterol or depression. Furthermore, autoimmune diseases such as psoriasis and inflammatory bowel diseases like Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis are more prevalent among those with MS. There is even a heightened risk of bladder cancer. Interaction of MS treatments and other common conditions like high...
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Hormones and Multiple Sclerosis
MS Living Well: Key Info from Multiple Sclerosis Experts
Sex hormones, such as estrogens and testosterone, affect each individual's journey living with multiple sclerosis. While both genders face equal MS risk before puberty and after menopause, women experience up to three times higher risk during their reproductive years. Pregnancy generally brings less relapses, potentially attributed to high estriol levels. However, navigating treatment decisions well while trying to conceive and after delivery requires finesse and expertise. Equip yourself with the latest women's health info regarding MS, covering topics from birth control and fertility...
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Revolutionizing Multiple Sclerosis Care: B-Cell Therapy
MS Living Well: Key Info from Multiple Sclerosis Experts
In a paradigm-shifting discovery, researchers uncovered that B cells, not T cells, wield significant influence on orchestrating neurological damage in MS. Join UCSF Professor Dr. Stephen Hauser as he shares the remarkable odyssey from hurdles to triumphs of developing B cell monoclonal antibody treatment for multiple sclerosis. Disease impact, safety concerns and personalization of MS treatment of these medications including Ocrevus (ocrelizumab), Kesimpta (ofatumumab) and Briumvi (ublituximab) are highlighted. Brain-penetrant BTK inhibitor therapies that may offer more direct...
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Recipe for Resilience: The Blind Cook and NMOSD
MS Living Well: Key Info from Multiple Sclerosis Experts
Christine Ha, an award-winning blind chef and restauranteur, shares her experience grappling with neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorder (NMOSD). Facing relapses with the inability to walk and feed herself that challenged her independence, she leaned on the support from family and friends. As she lost her sight due to optic neuritis in both eyes, Ms. Ha had to embark on a journey of rediscovery in the kitchen, starting with the fundamentals. Winning MasterChef Season 3 marked a turning point, propelling her culinary career forward despite the obstacles posed by her disability. NMOSD is...
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Making Strides: Enhancing MS Mobility
MS Living Well: Key Info from Multiple Sclerosis Experts
Wherever you are on your multiple sclerosis journey, there are many reasons to be optimistic about the future of mobility. Our experts, both holding doctorates in physical therapy, offer invaluable guidance on enhancing your walking abilities through targeted exercise and specialized therapy. Learn how to reduce the risk of falls, alleviate spasticity, and build endurance for a more active life. Cutting-edge technology, from wearable electrical stimulation devices to incredible exoskeletons, are revolutionizing mobility for those living with MS. Discover how neuromodulation, in conjunction...
info_outlineDr. Gavin Giovannoni describes in the podcast primary progressive MS, secondary progressive MS and active secondary progressive MS and whether or not these are truly different conditions. He moves beyond labels and explains that people with progressive disease, even those with limited mobility, can still be at risk of relapses affecting vision and arms. Continuing, switching or stopping disease-modifying therapy in progressive multiple sclerosis patients are covered. The impact of early MS damage, aging and ongoing, smoldering inflammation on progressive disease is described. Progressive multiple sclerosis treatments in clinical trials are highlighted including masitinib, BTK inhibitors, ibudilast, simvastatin, biotin, lipoic acid and remyelination strategies.
Mark Webb is Head of Communications for Shift.ms, an online community of over 38,000 people living with MS. Mark lives with secondary progressive multiple sclerosis and first developed MS symptoms back in 1992. He's a blog writer: onemanandhiscatheters.com, public speaker and rugby wheelchair player. Mark lives in the U.K. with wife and 2 sons.
Gavin Giovannoni MBBCh, PhD, FCP, FRCP, FRCPath is the Chair of Neurology of the Blizard Institute of Cell and Molecular Science, Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry at Queen Mary University of London. Professor Giovannoni completed his medical training and neurology training in South Africa. In addition, he completed a PhD in immunology from the University of London in 1998. He is particularly interested in clinical issues related to optimizing MS disease-modifying therapies including progressive disease.
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