Treating the MS itself, rather than the symptoms
February 17, 2020
I take a lot of drugs for pain and spasticity, but what about actually treating the disease itself?
There is no cure for MS. That’s the holy grail of research.
There are drugs called Disease Modifying Drugs (DMDs) or if it has a T on the end, DMT means Disease Modifying Treatments. These drugs hope to slow down the progression of the main type of MS, where there is inflammation causing the lesions. There are currently 10 of them. The first came in the early 1990s, and my friend Dee was on a clinical trial for them. It’s really hard to tell if they’re working, as they hope to slow down relapses, but you can’t tell easily.
I have taken 4. They seemed to have helped with one part of my MS but the other part of my MS is what’s called progressive. There is currently no treatment for progressive MS.
The one I currently take is called Tecfidera. Most days I get “flushing” from it. That’s like really painful sunburn that lasts for an hour.
Again, it’s all to do with choices. My MS is aggressive so I have chosen to tackle it like this.
There is always hope of new treatment. The big hope at the moment is for stem cell treatment. The MS Society has been involved in funding two major trials. The latest one is called MESCAMS, and you can read about it…here!
