The errant behavior of the cells in question — known as "B cells" — is viewed as key to the development of this chronic and disabling nervous system disease, commonly called MS.

The new therapy’s potential is only in the early stages of exploration, cautions an international study team comprised of researchers from the United States, Canada, Switzerland and the Netherlands, in the report published in the Nov. 1 online edition of The Lancet.

via New Multiple Sclerosis Therapy Promising in Early Trial.

Canadian researchers analyzed 432 births to women with MS and almost 3,000 births to women without MS in the province of British Columbia between 1998 and 2009. They found no significant differences in either timing of delivery or birth weight between babies born to women with MS and babies born to mothers without the illness.

The likelihood of vaginal or caesarian delivery was the same for both groups of women, but mothers with MS who had greater levels of disability had a slightly elevated risk of adverse delivery outcomes. However, the difference was not statistically significant and further research is needed, the study authors said.

via Pregnancy Safe for Most Women With MS: Study.

The study, published in the May 24 issue of the journal Neurology, also said the deficiency is due primarily to differences in climate and geography.

"MS is not as common in African-Americans as it is in whites, although the disease tends to be more severe in African-Americans," study author Dr. Ari J. Green, of the University of California, San Francisco, said in an American Academy of Neurology news release.

via MS in Blacks Linked to Low Vitamin D.

via New Pill for MS Shows Promise in Clinical Trial.

(HealthDay News) — As the debate over medical marijuana use continues, a new study among multiple sclerosis patients — who often use the drug to relieve pain and muscle spasticity — adds to the argument that smoking pot clouds thinking skills.

Canadian researchers studied two groups of 25 people between the ages of 18 and 65 with MS, an autoimmune disease that attacks the central nervous system and can lead to paralysis, cognitive problems, incontinence and a host of other sensory and functional deficits. One group used marijuana heavily, while the other group reported no marijuana use for many years.

Patients using pot performed significantly worse on cognitive tests measuring attention, thinking speed, executive function and visual perception of spatial relationships between objects, the study authors said. Users were also twice as likely to be classified as globally cognitively impaired, meaning they failed at least two of 11 various assessments.

The study is published in the March 29 issue of Neurology.

via Medical Marijuana Might Slow Thinking Among MS Patients.

The FDA declined to approve the drug "in its present form" and asked Merck to "provide an improved understanding of the safety risks and the overall benefit-risk profile," either through additional analyses or studies.

via Merck says US rejects its MS drug – Yahoo! News.

The researchers pushed the stem cells to grow into critical nervous system support cells called oligodendrocytes, according to a report released Thursday.
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The study, which tracked the medical records of more than 20,000 MS patients for 35 years, “found that they had some 10 percent decreased overall cancer risk compared with those without the disease,” said lead researcher Dr. Shahram Bahmanyar, from the Clinical Epidemiology Unit at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm.

Read on

California Vehicle Code

22511.5 (b) A disabled person or disabled veteran is allowed to park a vehicle displaying a special disabled person license plate or placard issued by a foreign jurisdiction with the same parking privileges authorized in this code for any vehicle displaying a special license plate or a distinguishing placard issued by the Department of Motor Vehicles.

So there.

Yesterday I was having a somewhat tough day with my MS. I was sick on Monday with something Lawrence picked up at school, so I was still somewhat shaky, and my muscles were just not working well. But I decided to go to Trader Joe’s anyway, since the fridge was looking a little empty.

I parked in a handicapped space, as I usually do, my Connecticut disabled parking placard in plain sight. I’m seeing my neurologist today, partly because I need her to fill out the form that will allow me to get a California one.

So when I come out, pretty pooped after half an hour of shopping, I see a parking ticket stuck under my windshield wiper. On top of it, some kind soul had left a note saying, “This is very inhospitable – can’t they see you are a visitor and wouldn’t have a Calif. permit?” Bless you, whoever you are. The note didn’t stop me from bursting into tears, but I felt better that someone understood I’d been screwed.

The moron who wrote the ticket wrote at the bottom, “Unable to read expiration date.” Well, gee, do you think that might be because, as it says in big letters, it’s a “Lifetime Disabled Parking Permit”? I would guess that the expiration date is the day I die, you idiot!

Of course, as I found when I called the police department, the problem was that the traffic cop didn’t know anything about Connecticut disabled permits. In fact, the cop who was manning the traffic department desk didn’t realize that, by federal law, all states must accept disabled parking permits from other states as valid in their own state.

So now, of course, I have to respond to the ticket by writing a letter and inclosing a copy of my disabled permit. Because, you know, I have nothing better to do than waste my time educating people about their jobs.

Can you tell I’m pissed off? As I said to the cop I talked to on the phone, “I’m sure I’m not the first person who’s used their out of state disabled permit here.” (It didn’t actually come out as snotty in person as it does in print, by the way. I managed to rein in my bitchiness.) He was very pleasant, and tried to find information about the law. I finally told him that he could probably get the information from our local congressperson’s office.

I really hate being disabled sometimes. There’s so much paperwork.