Barts-MS rose-tinted-odometer – zero stars Some of our readers are not satisfied with the Swedish Gothenburg 50-year follow-up data on MS outcomes, I presented yesterday; they make the comment that the data is out of date. However, there are very few databases that have 50+ year follow-up data; one of them is the Swedish National MS Register. The following is the latest Swedish registry...
Back in 2015 there was a great need to prognosticate in MS, predict high risk subjects from low risk, and select appropriate treatments based on disease activity in MS. We envisaged back then that the neurofilament test (a neuronal protein that is released during damage) would be a robust marker for risk-stratification in MS, and introduced into our clinical practice at Barts, instead of it being...
Barts-MS rose-tinted-odometer ★★★★★ I was attacked yesterday for painting a too bleak picture of MS outcomes and for not focusing on the fact that some pwMS actually age well and do well in the long-term. I apologise for being so negative, hence this post to address the data gap. The best data we have on the longterm follow-up of pwMS in a ‘community-setting’ is the Gothenburg study. In...
This is open access so for those interested, you can have a read. It says efficacy of HSCT is associated with lost of T cells from the CNS. I guess we could have guessed that this would happen, and one would suspect it should happen with any treatment that works. The study also serves to show that most people don’t give a monkey’s about B cells. Mention only T cells and there is no...
There has been a failure to translate ides from animals into human benefit. EAEers either do not care about this, which is one central problem, or sometimes people scratch their heads and try and come up with reasons for this failure. In this study it is suggested that aging is not accomodated in the thought process. This is totally accepted and indeed an aged mouse for example does not handle an...
Barts-MS rose-tinted-odometer – zero stars Someone recently asked what is advanced MS? I suspect they have been getting frustrated with our use of this adjective without a clearer understanding of what it really means. To find out if you have advanced MS you need to put yourself through a battery of stress tests to find-out much reserve you have left to deal with MS and life in the future...
Barts-MS rose-tinted-odometer ★ A big worry for neurologists and pwMS is the sequencing of DMTs. What DMTs can be used before and after each other and does the sequencing of DMTs change the risk profile of the individual DMTs concerned? These have been dealt with many times on this blog and I am in the final stages of completing phase 1 of my app that will address the specific issues around each...
Barts-MS rose-tinted-odometer ★★★ Not walking my talk. Having not taken up the NHS offer of the seasonal flu vaccine and having just spent the last 3 days bed-bound with severe flu I found the following research paper very timely. Using the Norwegian registries these investigators show that pwMS are much more susceptible to the complications of influenza, i.e. pwMS are much more likely to...
Dr.Ruth hasn’t got the log-in details of the new blog, so she asked me to post this. Dr.Ruth says As some of you may know one of the projects that we have been working on has been a vitamin D study in collaboration with the UK MS Register, called the ‘Vitamin D in people with MS’ study. We want to thank all of the participants who took part in this – those who filled out questionnaires, or...
What are you doing reading the blog today, you should be tucking into your Christmas pud or your favourite holiday treat.Yesterday I found a new use for a wheelchair. Meet my new friend Robbi on their new perch. Robbi is happy that he/she are not a pheasant….who are currently being blasted by shotgun-toting nobodies. If you really want to kill a pheasant it is easier to get in a car and run...