Source: MS Society

New research has found that MRI scans can help predict how MS will progress. MRI is already used to diagnose MS.

Results of a long-term study are being announced at the MS Society’s research conference, MS Frontiers 2017. The event brings together the UK’s leading scientists and clinicians every other year to share their latest findings.

Long-term insights

The study at the Queen Square Multiple Sclerosis Centre ran for 15 years and involved 164 people with clinically isolated syndrome (CIS). People with CIS have experienced one episode of neurological symptoms and often go on to be diagnosed with MS.

Researchers looked back at MRI scans carried out when people were first diagnosed with CIS. They found that early spinal cord damage was a sign that people were much more likely to go on to develop the secondary progressive form of MS.

They also discovered that having a spinal cord MRI scan not only helped with diagnosis, but also gave an insight into the level of disability a person was likely to face in the future.

The study was funded by the MS Society and led by Dr Wallace Brownlee and Professor Olga Ciccarelli.  Read on.

Source: MS Trust

The next step in the approval process is for the European Commission to grant a licence for cladribine, taking into consideration the EMA’s recommendation. Cladribine will then have to be appraised by NICE and the SMC to determine availability in the UK.

In anticipation of the granting of a licence, NICE have already started the appraisal process and a decision is expected to be published in February 2018. The MS Trust is contributing to the appraisal. If NICE approves the use of cladribine, it could be available on the NHS from June 2018.  Read on.

Source: The Telegraph

Travellers who are currently suffering from illness or have been diagnosed with various conditions could struggle to get cover when they go on holiday, or end up paying through the nose for it.

Those with health problems, or even those who had issues in the past, are deemed more risky for an insurance company to cover and so are more likely to need treatment while abroad, which the insurer will need to foot the bill for.

This can drive up the cost of insurance and may mean that those looking for cover need to get it from a specialist provider.

Below we’ve listed what kind of factors impact price and the providers who offer the cheapest cover.

For example, holidaymakers in their 20s taking medication for high blood pressure will find it easier to get cheaper travel insurance than someone over the age of 80 with the same condition.  Read on.

Source: Multiple Sclerosis News Today

A variation in the NLRP1 gene is associated with multiple sclerosis that runs in families, Slovenian researchers report.

Their study, “Identification of rare genetic variation of NLRP1 gene in familial multiple sclerosis,” was published in the journal Scientific Reports. The research was led by Dr. Borut Peterlin of Ljubljana University Medical Center’s Clinical Institute of Medical Genetics.

Scientists believe MS arises from a combination of a person’s genetic background and the environment. Although previous studies have suggested that genes are behind MS that runs in families, researchers had yet to confirm that hypothesis.

The Slovenian team wanted to identify any genes that were at play in both the MS and malignant melanoma that two siblings had. Although disease surveys indicate the two conditions can occur together, scientists had been unable to identify a shared cause for the two conditions.  Read on.

Source: BBC

The world’s most detailed scan of the brain’s internal wiring has been produced by scientists at Cardiff University.

The MRI machine reveals the fibres which carry all the brain’s thought processes.

It’s been done in Cardiff, Nottingham, Cambridge and Stockport, as well as London England and London Ontario.

Doctors hope it will help increase understanding of a range of neurological disorders and could be used instead of invasive biopsies.

I volunteered for the project – not the first time my brain has been scanned.  Read on and watch fascinating video of the scan here.

Source Israel21c

Israeli scientists discover an abnormality in neurons’ protective membrane may enable the immune system to launch a mistaken attack.

Researchers have long speculated that MS is triggered by the body’s own immune system unleashing an uncontrolled attack on myelin sheaths that protect nerve cells (neurons).

A study published by Israeli scientists in the Journal of the American Chemical Society (JACS) pinpoints a structural instability in the myelin membranes, the “insulating tape” surrounding neurons.

This vulnerability seems to be what gives the immune system access to otherwise protected regions.  Read on.

Source MS Society