The Many Faces of Multiple Sclerosis
What do former talk show host Montel Williams, country music star Clay Walker, Mitt Romney’s wife Ann, and Jack Osborn (son of Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne) have in common? All have multiple sclerosis (MS), a nervous system disease that affects your brain and spinal cord.
Researchers think MS is an autoimmune disease, which means the immune system mistakenly attacks healthy tissue. The resulting damage interrupts communication between your brain and your body, causing symptoms such as:
- Facial pain
- Double vision, eye discomfort
- Dizziness
- Muscle weakness or spasms
- Decreased attention span, memory problems, difficulty solving problems
- Tremors, numbness, tingling and/or burning in arms and legs
- Bowel and bladder issues
- Depression or sadness
- Slurred speech, trouble chewing and swallowing
MS can be difficult to diagnose because symptoms mimic those of other diseases and can worsen for days, weeks, or months and then suddenly disappear. Even so, approximately 200 people are diagnosed every week in the United States: more women than men, often between the ages of 20 and 40.
Most patients are mildly affected — experiencing short bouts of symptoms followed by long stretches of relief — and life expectancy can be almost normal. There is simply no way to predict how the disease will progress in each individual.
While there is no cure (yet!) for MS, scientists are working hard to develop new medicines and therapies to treat symptoms, slow the disease’s progression, and even repair damaged brain and spinal cord cells. Meantime, physical therapy and exercise can help preserve remaining function, and some people use alternative treatments such as acupuncture, aromatherapy, biofeedback, yoga, and tai chi.
To learn more about Veterans with MS and VA’s efforts to fight the disease, go to http://www.va.gov/ms.
"We’ve been studying how antibodies attack nerve cells for years, and now this mechanism is gaining national and international scientific recognition," said Dr. Michael Levin, researcher at the Memphis VA. MS is an autoimmune disease in which a person’s own immune system attacks nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord, and MS is one of the most common neurological diseases to affect middle-aged adults. Traditionally, the immune response was thought only to destroy the protective coating of nerve cells, known as myelin. However, there has been an important shift in thinking. Recent studies indicate that the immune response also directly attacks nerve cells, leading to neuronal injury, in a process known as neurodegeneration. For more information, visit http://www.memphis.va.gov.
