Multiple Sclerosis

Experimental data suggest that memory-retraining exercises and other cognitive rehabilitation techniques may improve memory acquisition and retention in patients with multiple sclerosis.

Pain is a common symptom in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS), with some studies showing that clinically significant pain associated with their disease is experienced by more than half of patients with MS.

Comprehensive care for patients with MS starts with medical treatment of the symptoms of their disease, but must also include intervention by clinicians who can address the mental, physical, and social challenges experienced by many patients.

Early diagnosis is one of the most important characteristics of effective MS treatment, since the greatest irreversible disabilities tend to occur early in the course of MS disease progression.

Physicians must consider a range of factors when initiating treatment with disease-modifying drug therapy and be prepared to switch to another first- or second-line option if the patient fails to respond.

Monoclonal antibodies, chimeric molecules, and other immunomodulating drugs and novel approaches hold real promise for effectively treating multiple sclerosis.

Treating patients with multiple sclerosis who opt to use only supplements and other complementary and alternative approaches requires a great deal of tact and education, and input and support from all members of the multidisciplinary treatment team.

In a mouse model of MS, mice treated with the mitochondrial translocator protein ligand etifoxine experienced reduced symptom severity.

Study from Kaiser Permanente contradicts the widely accepted assertion that blacks have a lower risk of multiple sclerosis than whites.

Recent study results show no benefit from percutaneous transluminal venous angioplasty in improving symptoms of patients with multiple sclerosis.

Approved by the FDA in September 2012, Genzyme's Aubagio (teriflunomide tablets) is a once-daily oral treatment shown to reduce relapses, slow physical disability progression and reduce the number of brain lesions detected by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in patients with relapsing forms of multiple sclerosis (MS).

Compared with placebo, teriflunomide was shown to significantly reduce the occurrence of relapses with sequelae and relapses treated with corticosteroids in a post-hoc analysis of pivotal clinical trial data.

While phenotypes of multiple sclerosis (MS) are well-established, there remains heterogeneity among patients that fit existing clinical definitions.

Oral dimethyl fumarate (BG-12) is in development for the treatment of relapsing multiple sclerosis (MS), though experimental evidence already suggests it may provide anti-inflammatory and cytoprotective effects by activating the transcription factor Nrf2.

Better understanding of the processes of cortical rewiring and recruitment will enable researchers to develop more effective treatments for multiple sclerosis.

Results from the multicenter SET study suggest that smoking, response to Epstein Barr virus, and other environmental factors contribute to disease progression in multiple sclerosis.

MRI studies show comorbid depression and fatigue may have an effect on gray matter atrophy in specific regions of the brain in patients with multiple sclerosis.

MRI data shows that multiple sclerosis patients with central neuropathic pain often have lesions focused in the center of the mid-thoracic spinal cord.

Electronic data can be used to create "virtual cohorts" to rapidly implement studies of MS disease activity, comorbidities, pharmacogenomics, and presymptomatic disease.

More than 90% of participants in the Therapy Optimization in Multiple Sclerosis (TOP MS) study were still on their original disease modifying therapy at one year follow-up.

Fernando Figueira, MD, and his associates from the Hospital São Francisco, in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil, called for expanded requirements for "disease-free" designation in multiple sclerosis (MS) patients in a Multiple Sclerosis Treatment poster session at the American Academy of Neurology (AAN) 2013 Annual Meeting.

In the Multiple Sclerosis Treatment Safety poster session at the American Academy of Neurology (AAN) 2013 Annual Meeting, Barry Singer, a neurologist at the Missouri Baptist Medical Center, in St. Louis, and founder and director of the MS Center for Innovations in Care, and his co-authors presented an analysis of infection rates in three placebo-controlled teriflunomide studies.

In the Multiple Sclerosis Treatment Safety poster session at the American Academy of Neurology (AAN) 2013 Annual Meeting, Paul O'Connor, of St. Michael's Hospital, in Toronto, and his colleagues presented a study designed to determine whether immune responses to seasonal influenza vaccination are preserved in teriflunomide-treated patients with relapsing forms of multiple sclerosis (RMS).

Seminar at the American Academy of Neurology annual meeting discusses the systematic approach to diagnosing patients with MS, initial medication selection, and changing treatments.

Disease activity, patient preference, and other factors should be considered when selecting DMT for the treatment of multiple sclerosis.

Study results suggest that age and timing of treatment initiation with interferon beta therapy may play a larger role than relapse in long-term disability in patients with multiple sclerosis.

The oral disease-modifying drug under development for the treatment of relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis, teriflunomide, was not superior to interferon beta-1a in risk of treatment failure.

In the course of a 24-week cessation of treatment with the humanized monoclonal antibody, natalizumab, in patients with RRMS, pharmacokinetic, pharmacodynamic, and serum immune parameters normalized by 4 months.

People discharged from the hospital with MS are 30% less likely to have had a myocardial infarction and 58% less likely to have ischemic heart disease.

Treatment with the investigational oral treatment for relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis, dimethyl fumarate (aka BG-12), yielded significant reductions in the annualized relapse rate and risk of relapse.