Health Advice An answer to your medical questions » Multiple Sclerosis http://healthadviceguide.com By Kevin Bond MD Fri, 03 Sep 2010 13:19:34 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.1 Cure for Multiple Sclerosis http://healthadviceguide.com/cure-for-multiple-sclerosis.html http://healthadviceguide.com/cure-for-multiple-sclerosis.html#comments Fri, 03 Sep 2010 13:19:34 +0000 Kevin http://healthadviceguide.com/?p=1301 In this article we shall discuss some of the alternative therapies which may cure multiple sclerosis because there are plenty of patients who like to opt for the alternative medicine approach rather than the conventional medical cure to relieve the symptoms of MS.

No one can really guarantee the efficacy or safety of alternative cure for multiple sclerosis and this kind of cure is not certainly something that your doctor will prescribe. Usually it depends upon the individual patient to select whichever alternative therapy course he or she feels will be suitable.

However, before selecting any alternative cure for multiple sclerosis, you must discuss the pros and cons with your doctor and you must also know that medical insurance will not cover the expenses for alternative therapies.

Aromatherapy
Aromatherapy is nothing but application of scented thickly concentrated essential and carrier oils on the body. The aromatic fragrance that is released helps to relax and calm the patient but apart from that, there isn’t any specific use of this therapy.

Marijuana or Cannabis
Now this bit of info will surely leave many people stumped but there are quite a few patients who have gone on record saying that their pain is eased, and their emotional state and spasticity are improved through the smoking of marijuana! However, you must know that it is illegal to smoke or possess marijuana and medical research is investigating the link between smoking marijuana and easing of pain.
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Chiropractic
You cannot really call it an alternative therapy that will cure MS but it does help in providing some relief from back pain through physical manipulation.

Cold immersion
When the weather becomes too hot and humid, the symptoms of MS manifest very strongly and cause a lot of discomfort to the patient. Through cold immersions and cooling treatments whether conducted in the pool or in the bath, the patient can experience some much needed relief. The treatment is inexpensive and safe and temperature sensitive patients can gain from this particular treatment.

Some other alternative cures for multiple sclerosis are herbal medicines, bee venom, acupuncture etc but you have to realize that the course of the disease cannot be altered by alternative cure for MS.

]]> http://healthadviceguide.com/cure-for-multiple-sclerosis.html/feed 0 Multiple Sclerosis Society http://healthadviceguide.com/multiple-sclerosis-society.html http://healthadviceguide.com/multiple-sclerosis-society.html#comments Fri, 03 Sep 2010 13:18:05 +0000 Kevin http://healthadviceguide.com/?p=1304 Multiple sclerosis is a progressively degenerative and disabling autoimmune disease that negatively targets many areas of the central nervous system as well as the white matter and produces diverse symptoms, mainly fatigue, problems with balance and coordination, sensory and visual problems, motor symptoms, bladder – urinary – sexual symptoms, cognitive symptoms and many other such symptoms.

Although it is not a life threatening or fatal disease, it is a crippling disease that can lead to partial spasticity and people suffering from multiple sclerosis, (the number of women sufferers are more than that of men) usually require a lot of care and support from care givers, family members and friends and they also at times require the need of an assistive device.

There are various kinds of multiple sclerosis support groups and societies available all over the world – some are big MS societies with an international presence boasting of MS society chapters in every other country while others are domestic or national.

There is a dire need for a multiple sclerosis society in every country and every state and perhaps every city because once a person is diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, she or he feels really lonely, is terrified, feels helpless and slips into a depression. Friends and family members and immediate care givers often feel really drained and tired while trying to care for an MS patient and it takes a lot of guts and mental strength just to keep afloat.

This is where the MS societies step in. Not only do they teach the patients the necessary life skills to handle their symptoms, they also provide vital moral support to the patients and the friends and family members and educate them and others about MS symptoms, how to take care of MS patients, what to do in case of emergencies, whom to contact, how to instill positivity and hope in an MS patient etc, apart from funding medical research on MS and MS cure.

One such renowned MS society is the National Multiple Sclerosis Society which performs all of the functions mentioned above and from where you can receive the most up to date information on multiple sclerosis. Other MS societies are MSAA Multiple Sclerosis Association of America and Multiple Sclerosis Foundation.

]]> http://healthadviceguide.com/multiple-sclerosis-society.html/feed 0 Pregnancy with Multiple Sclerosis http://healthadviceguide.com/pregnancy-with-multiple-sclerosis.html http://healthadviceguide.com/pregnancy-with-multiple-sclerosis.html#comments Fri, 03 Sep 2010 13:16:56 +0000 Kevin http://healthadviceguide.com/?p=1310 The problem with pregnancy with multiple sclerosis is that in many cases, the multiple sclerosis condition is identified and diagnosed just when a woman is planning pregnancy.

In the past, if a woman contracted sclerosis, she was discouraged from pregnancy.
The reason was very simple. Medical science at that time believed that multiple sclerosis could get worse due to pregnancy and childbirth.

No one would be there to mother the newborn infant. But medical science has advanced a lot in current times and in keeping with that, there is hope yet. Medical research has now concluded that for women with multiple sclerosis, pregnancy might actually be protective.

And the kind of contemporary therapies that are administered to women with multiple sclerosis, there are high chances of a new mother performing her duties towards her infant and maintaining her physical activities successfully. Women can even run around and undertake strenuous physical activities.

A woman with multiple sclerosis can have a baby and should have a baby, if the other factors are favorable. However, be ready to face quite a few challenges physically and while caring for your infants. That is why, if you are suffering from multiple sclerosis and are also planning pregnancy, you must talk to mothers, take feedbacks from them, observe little children and how their mothers care for them and other such things.

It will help you to obtain a realistic picture and then you must consult your husband and support group and other family members before taking the leap for pregnancy. You must remember that women with multiple sclerosis require additional help to raise kids as they might not be able to take the physical strain.

Multiple sclerosis has no link with still birth or preterm birth or ectopic pregnancy or miscarriage and other such associated pregnancy problems or with congenital abnormalities or fertility problems. Women suffering from multiple sclerosis can enjoy healthy, normal pregnancy like all other women of their age group.

And contrary to popular belief, most or at times all of the symptoms of multiple sclerosis are relieved during pregnancy and the symptoms DO NOT get worse during the pre partum phase.
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]]> http://healthadviceguide.com/pregnancy-with-multiple-sclerosis.html/feed 0 Tests for Multiple Sclerosis http://healthadviceguide.com/tests-for-multiple-sclerosis.html http://healthadviceguide.com/tests-for-multiple-sclerosis.html#comments Fri, 03 Sep 2010 13:15:53 +0000 Kevin http://healthadviceguide.com/?p=1313 To diagnose multiple sclerosis you have to visit a doctor who will conduct a series of physical findings and consult the results of diagnostic tests as well as look at the case history and symptoms.
Of course to diagnose MS, the doctors will look at a few criteria.

The central nervous system must be damaged at more than one place. The damages to the CNS will be due to demyelination. Another criterion that physicians will look at will involve 2 identifiable and separate exacerbations which have to take place in a time frame of a month apart from each other. You might wonder what an exacerbation is. When the multiple sclerosis symptoms get worse for a minimum period of 2 days, it is called exacerbation.

Tests for Multiple Sclerosis
Among the many kinds of tests that are conducted for multiple sclerosis, 2 will be medical history assessment and neurological examination. The doctor will conduct a series of tests that will assess the function of all the 5 senses, and test your balance, vision, coordination, movement etc.

Another test that is conducted to identify and diagnose MS is the Evoked Potential Test. This test involves an electrical study that has the power to record whether the various sections of the brain are slowing down or not or whether the rate of message transfer is slowing down. The limbs, neck and scalp are enmeshed in wires during this test and the vision and hearing abilities are also assessed.

One more test conducted to identify Multiple sclerosis condition is magnetic resonance imaging or MRI. A physician can find out if there is scarring and/or lesions in the brain by imaging the brain. Compared to CT scan, an MRI test is way better for detecting scarring and lesions.

And if the doctor wants to detect the presence of elevated protein levels or oligoclonal bands inside the spinal column where flows the CSF or cerebro spinal fluid, then a Lumbar Puncture test is ideal. In order to collect CSF during this test, the doctor will prick into the base of the spine a long needle to test for multiple sclerosis.

]]> http://healthadviceguide.com/tests-for-multiple-sclerosis.html/feed 0 What Causes Multiple Sclerosis http://healthadviceguide.com/what-causes-multiple-sclerosis.html http://healthadviceguide.com/what-causes-multiple-sclerosis.html#comments Fri, 03 Sep 2010 13:13:58 +0000 Kevin http://healthadviceguide.com/?p=1315 Multiple sclerosis is an autoimmune chronic progressively disabling disease that strikes the white matter and damages it as well as the central nervous system.

There is still a lot of doubt and controversy regarding what exactly causes multiple sclerosis but some studies have shown that definite roles are played by a virus, an individual’s environment as well as genetics.

The virus factor
There is no conclusive proof that multiple sclerosis is also caused by virus but flu viruses, herpes virus, measles virus are contributory factors, according to some studies.

More potential factors
A few more potential factors that may be the reason behind multiple sclerosis are different kinds of hormones such as sex hormones. The body’s immune system can get affected by them. For instance, the body’s immune activity gets suppressed at times by both progesterone and estrogen. These are the female sex hormones. The male sex hormone testosterone has also been known to suppress the body immune response.

You may know by now that multiple sclerosis is actually protective for pregnant women and that is because progesterone and estrogen levels are higher during this period. And so pregnant women suffer from lesser number of diseases if they already have MS. And because men have more male sex hormones than female hormones, women contract MS more easily and in greater numbers than men.

Genetic factor
Medical research has also suggested that people in the same family with a history of multiple sclerosis may be genetically predisposed towards it and usually children can inherit this disease from parents.

]]> http://healthadviceguide.com/what-causes-multiple-sclerosis.html/feed 0 Multiple Sclerosis Treatment http://healthadviceguide.com/multiple-sclerosis-treatment.html http://healthadviceguide.com/multiple-sclerosis-treatment.html#comments Tue, 24 Nov 2009 23:36:16 +0000 Kevin http://healthadviceguide.com/?p=1308 There is treatment available for multiple sclerosis which can provide a lot of relief in the long run. Disease modifying therapies for MS came into existence from the nineteen nineties.



Since MS is a progressively disabling and degenerating disease, usually treatment is administered for the MS symptoms. Usually MS treatment aims at slowing down or retarding the rate of progressive disability.


However, one thing you have to understand clearly – the disease multiple sclerosis itself cannot be eliminated through disease modifying therapies. As pointed out just now, the progress will be delayed and the annual exacerbation rate will be minimized. Following is a list of treatments available for multiple sclerosis.


Betaseron or Interferon Beta 1b
This multiple sclerosis treatment involves injecting under the skin a medication called Betaseron every alternate day. In most cases the injection is given in the abdomen or buttocks or thighs because these zones are rich in fat and the incidences of skin reaction and post injection pain will be lesser. The reactions are lessened if the injections are applied on the butts. The side effects and reactions that can result from Betaseron are necrosis, shrinkage of tissue where the medicine has been injected, bruising, pain, redness etc.


Sometimes the multiple sclerosis symptoms may also include the signs of flu and the side effects are sore muscles, chills, aches, fever, headache etc. If you take the injection at bedtime before going to sleep, the side effects will not be as bothersome.


Avonex or Interferon Beta 1a
This injection for multiple sclerosis has to be administered not more than once a week and that too intramuscularly. You can choose to take the injection either in the arms or in the thighs. Some of the side effects that have been reported are aches, chills, headache, fever and other such flu like symptoms. If you take ibuprofen or acetaminophen, then the side effects will be reduced.


Another way of getting to reduce the pain and discomfort of side effects of multiple sclerosis is to take the injection at bedtime. Some more treatments include Rebif, Copaxone or Glatiramer Acetate. In case of some multiple sclerosis patients the number of flare ups will remain the same while in case of others, there will be no such significant exacerbations.


]]> http://healthadviceguide.com/multiple-sclerosis-treatment.html/feed 0 Multiple Sclerosis Symptoms http://healthadviceguide.com/multiple-sclerosis-symptoms.html http://healthadviceguide.com/multiple-sclerosis-symptoms.html#comments Tue, 24 Nov 2009 23:33:41 +0000 Kevin http://healthadviceguide.com/?p=1306 Quite a vast number of the body’s functions are controlled by the white matter and the central nervous system and when the white matter gets damaged, the kind of symptoms that are produced can be diverse and wide ranging.



Multiple sclerosis has some of the most potent symptoms and warnings signs among the various types of diseases.


Multiple sclerosis symptoms can be classified into the following categories – cognitive, sexual, bladder, bowel, balance and coordination, sensory, motor, and visual and others. Following is a list of symptoms of multiple sclerosis.


Visual symptoms
Visual multiple sclerosis problems include afferent papillary defect which means abnormal responses of the pupil, sound and movement phosphenes or experiencing/seeing flashing lights when the eyes are suddenly moved or when the person hears a sudden noise, internuclear ophthalmoplegia or when the two eyes don’t have any coordination between them, between the diplopia and the nystagmus.


Some more visual multiple sclerosis symptoms include constant overshooting or undershooting eye movement which is called ocular dysmetria, jerky eye movements and double vision which are called nystagmus and diplopia respectively, and optic neuritis or blindness/loss of color vision/eye pain/blurred vision etc.


Motor symptoms
Some of the motor symptoms are MSRs, Chaddock’s, Hoffman’s, Babinski’s which are all dysfunctional reflexes, dragging your foot along the floor while walking, involuntary leg movements which become really bothersome while sleeping at night, tics, twitching and jerking muscles, posture problems, involuntary contraction of muscles, muscle atrophy, speech problems and slurred speech, spasticity, quadriplegia, tetraplegia, hemiplegia, paraplegia, plegia, mild paralysis or partial paralysis, muscle weakness.


More symptoms
Some more multiple sclerosis symptoms include sleeping disorders, autonomic nervous system problems, inappropriately cold body parts, respiratory problems, swallowing problems, epileptic seizures, impaired sense of smell and taste, acid reflux, Uhthoff’s symptom, fatigue.


Cognitive symptoms
The cognitive multiple sclerosis symptoms include dysphasia, aphasia, anxiety, bipolar syndrome, euphoria, emotional lability, mood swings, dementia, cognitive dysfunction, depression etc.


Sexual, bladder and bowel symptoms
They are fecal incontinence, fecal urgency, constipation, frigidity, retrograde ejaculation, anorgasmy, erectile dysfunction, urinary hesitancy and retention, bladder spasticity and frequent micturation.


Coordination and balance symptoms
They include dysdiadochokinesia, dystonia, speech ataxia, vertigo, vestibular ataxia, dysmetria, intention tremor and ataxia.


]]> http://healthadviceguide.com/multiple-sclerosis-symptoms.html/feed 0 Multiple Sclerosis and Support http://healthadviceguide.com/multiple-sclerosis-and-support.html http://healthadviceguide.com/multiple-sclerosis-and-support.html#comments Tue, 24 Nov 2009 22:09:57 +0000 Kevin http://healthadviceguide.com/?p=1302 Patients who suffer from multiple sclerosis require constant support from friends, family and from MS support groups.



Caring for a MS sufferer can be a taxing and draining experience and it is in order to provide some support to the family members and enhance an MS patient’s quality of life, that MS support groups have been formed. MS support groups are so essential because when a patient is diagnosed with MS, she or he feels really alone, depressed and terrified.


The patients need to come to terms with this disease called multiple sclerosis and besides they also require learning all those life skills which can enable them to safely handle their MS symptoms. All these things are taught by MS support groups. The various functions of an MS support group are educating the family members, friends and caregivers about MS, providing counseling to the patients and the family members, referring patients to social programs for acquiring financial assistance or to recreational clubs or self help groups which are all additional support services.


One more vital function that an MS support group performs is the providing of support and information to patients, students, institutions, employers and health care professionals. There are trained staff and volunteers in each support organization to perform these duties.


One of the most renowned MS support organizations in USA is the National Multiple Sclerosis Society which was founded in 1946 and also supports medical research on MS apart from educating and providing support to patients and their families and this organization has also been known to take part in multiple sclerosis advocacy efforts.


In fact most of the multiple sclerosis support groups spread across the world, either of the international variety or the domestic or national variety are geared towards providing the same kind of care, support, educational information to patients and family and friends and the main goal of most of these support organizations is to find out a proper cure for MS, completely eradicate MS from the world and support continued research on this field.


In fact if you do a search in the internet, you will surely find an multiple sclerosis support organization near your neighborhood.


]]> http://healthadviceguide.com/multiple-sclerosis-and-support.html/feed 0 Multiple sclerosis advice http://healthadviceguide.com/multiple-sclerosis-advice.html http://healthadviceguide.com/multiple-sclerosis-advice.html#comments Tue, 24 Nov 2009 21:59:15 +0000 Kevin http://healthadviceguide.com/?p=1299 multiple-sclerosis2
Multiple sclerosis is usually referred to MS for short. Multiple sclerosis is usually found to strike individuals between the age group of 20 years and 40 years.



It is a unpredictable neurological autoimmune disease that damages the white matter and negatively affects the central nervous system.


There are hundreds of different kinds of multiple sclerosis symptoms which you can classify as motor, sensory, cognitive, balance and coordination, urinary, bladder and sexual symptoms, visual symptoms and other varieties of symptoms.


A few symptoms of multiple sclerosis will include fatigue, cognitive difficulties, slurred speech, incoordination, vertigo, tremors, spasticity, pain, weakness, double vision and blurred vision and other such symptoms. There is no fear of severe handicap with multiple sclerosis and those who do experience such crippling problems are usually few in number.


A few people will need an assistive device to perform the daily routine functions while 2/3 of the multiple sclerosis sufferers continue to remain in an ambulatory state. So you may not always fear paralysis.


At least 1/3 million people living in USA have been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. Studies have shown that the incidences of multiple sclerosis are higher among women than among men. Caucasians are the most likely to get sclerosis.


We cannot really say for sure that a multiple sclerosis sufferer has inherited the disease, but certain members in one family do have a predisposition towards MS and you cannot really undermine the hereditary factor.


Usually multiple sclerosis symptoms manifest themselves when the myelin gets inflamed and breaks down. When the destruction of myelin takes place, scars of tissue substitute the myelin. You can call this phenomenon plaques or lesions. However there is no fear of life expectancy getting shortened because multiple sclerosis isn’t a fatal disease. Nor is it contagious. However it is chronic.


There are different types of multiple sclerosis with which you should get familiar such as progressive relapsing, primary progressive multiple sclerosis, secondary progressive multiple sclerosis and relapsing remitting multiple sclerosis. In order to minimize the rate of annual exacerbation and to delay the progression of disability, you can avail of injectible treatments. And of course other kinds of specific sclerosis medications can be administered to relieve the symptoms of MS.


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