My wife recently bought a remarkable book for me last month and I cannot put it down. It is titled “Oxygen and the Brain. The Journey of Our Lifetime” by Emeritus Professor of Medicine Philip James. It is a revelation and especially on the diagnosis of MS on pages 223 - 225."The first committee to set out the criteria for the diagnosis for multiple sclerosis was convened in 1974 by Dr George Schumacher and it was a stipulation that “dissemination in time and space” was a requirement.
“It seems obvious that the dilemma posed by the so-called diagnosis of multiple sclerosis would be solved if a diagnostic test was found. However, despite the disease being clearly recognised over 140 years ago, there is still no such test and there are very good reasons to doubt that there ever can be.”
Earlier on the page, “The terms multiple and sclerosis, meaning “many” and “scars”, are simply a description of more than one area of damage in the nervous system. The requirement for “dissemination in time” is frequently used to delay telling patients they have the disease and this delay … is often measured in years.”
We have all heard of people with disabling symptoms having to wait a long time before getting any treatment. So I thought people here would interested to read this. There is a lot more about emboli and blood brain barrier damage being intimately associated with the disease. I am finding it pretty hot stuff to read.
I think it really explains why MS is different for each and every one of us. In that we all have the ‘many scars’ in our brains, but what caused them in the first place, why each of us can have very different symptoms, and why the immune system then starts attacking us… it’s all a mystery really.
It’s why I think the cure might still be a way off… surely what will cure some will not cure others?
Pretty hot stuff Rob? Hmmm. Maybe you need to get out more…
“The central tenet of auto-immunity postulates that the immune cells of the body attack normal tissue. Somehow, it is postulated, a component of the normal tissue becomes an antigen in multiple sclerosis patients and is said to attack the myelin which forms the sheaths around many nerve fibres. However, a trigger is usually suggested which initiates the sequence of events. It is usually claimed that it is a virus. However, no virus has ever been found in [more than 60] years of research; which has even included biopsies being taken from the brains of patients during acute attacks. Equally, no antigen has ever been identified in normal tissue. Despite the lack of scientific evidence the viral-auto-immune theory is often presented as certain fact.” [In medical papers by medical professionals.]
Billions of dollars are spent on research developing drugs to suppress the autoimmune system - which is apparently involved in recovery in stroke patients!
Apparently it is the scars or lesions on the spinal cord which are the most important. They appear as bright objects and are referred to as UBOs or unidentified bright objects. I understand that scars or lesions which appear in the brain in MRI pictures can often disappear two weeks later on MRI pictures.
Yes this book is “hot stuff”. The best I have encountered in 30 years with MS and I have used HBOT weekly for most of that time so obviously a profound work on Oxygen and the Brain is worth our attention. I believe they are working on serialising it in the Daily Telegraph in the New Year.
Inflammation is another key to all this as I understand it. There is a paper , “Oxygen and Inflammation” by Carl Nathan of Weil Medical College, Cornell University USA. The affected areas on the spinal cord and the brain are inflamed and inflammation causes the level of oxygen in the body tissues to fall.