I predict that next year we will see more and more on EBV research. B cell therapy is being rebranded as EBV-specific therapy as it is evident that EBV infects B cells and turns them into memory B cells, which I would argue is the target for MS drugs. Will I get dragged into the EBVology road show? Maybe a bit but where do you start? This is perhaps where I think I should not follow the...
To delay or not to delay that is the vaccination issue with anti-CD20…Have the neuros thought about it?
this one may be abit scientific to grap a cuppa and read slowly MORE COVID-19 VACCINATION STUDIES INDICATING A DELAY TO INCREASE CHANCE OF VACCINATION RESPONSE I have long argued that the biology indicated that the best way to increase your SARS-COV-2 vaccine response if you were taking rituximab or ocrelizumab was to delay the infusion until more than 6 months between infusions. This allows the...
As a researcher what is my perspetive of communicating atrophy and a person with MS. What do you want?
Atrophy is the loss of brain tissue that is often detected using some MRI scans, and is the balance between loss of brain tissue due to aging and MS and the space filling by scar tissue. This is the underlying cause of accumulting disability. ProfG has spoken about the “shredder”. I am not so sure this is the way to go, but it is important that people understand that MS is a bad...
Ofatumumab COVID-19 vaccine response
This study suggests that most people on ofatumumab make a SARS-COv-2 antibody response…Hurray CD20-depleting antibodies have been associated with reduced antibody responses following SARS-CoV-2 vaccination and this has been seen with ocrelizumab in MS and rituximab in MS, cancer, rheumatoid arthritis, et. However, this inhibition is coupled with essentially a normal T cell response. We can...
MS COIVD#19 Risk of omicron infection
As someone who caught omicron after vaccination, it doesn’t surprise me that people on fingolimod and anti-CD20 are slightly likely to get infected with omicron. This is because antibody levels are required to protect you from infection and to protect against omicron you need 20-80 times more antibodies than against Wuhan virus so as fingolimod and ocrelizumab reduce vaccine induced...
It can make your pee smell, but is it the next cure of the week
Background: About 5 to 10 percent of the population in developed countries are affected by autoimmune diseases. One of the most important autoimmune disease with high prevalence rate is Multiple sclerosis in which there is currently no definitive cure for it, and most medications such as interferons are used only to limit the disease. The present study aims to investigate the effect of...
Q & A December
Sorry forgot to do this
A bit of Christmas Cheer from the Team
What are you doing here? You should be tucking into your roast turkey, nut roast or what ever tickles your fancy (That doesn’t sound right). I didn’t expect my fridge-Freezer to go on solidarity with the people in Ukraine and pack-up (Too late to get a repair person of a new machine)….I turned my Christmas lights (above) off already….all is thawed and Dinner is now in the...
Happy Holiday
From me, ProfG and the Team….may we wish you a happy holiday where ever you are.
How does ocrelizumab work?
I have been thinking about how ofatumumab and ocrelizumab work….simple answer is that they both deplete CD20 B cells and we see B cell being disappeared and they stay disappeared from the blood as long as treatment is maintained. How do they repopulate when you stop. It seems that this is faster with ofatumumab. A simple explanation is that it takes longer to recover after ocrelizumab...