All About Multiple Sclerosis

What is it?

It has been scientifically determined that multiple sclerosis can potentially debilitate a person. This means that the body’s own immune system attacks the sheath that protects the nerves. Once this sheath is damaged or totally destroyed, the normal communication between the person’s brain and the rest of the body is interfered. This condition results into the deteriorating of the nerves, a complication that can never be reversed.

Its symptoms

The symptoms of multiple sclerosis may vary depending on how much damage has occurred to the nerves that are affected. Those who have the severe type of multiple sclerosis can end up being bedridden since their ability to walk or to talk is destroyed.

What is very bothersome about these symptoms is that they tend to come and go. This means that they could suddenly arrive and then suddenly disappear for a few months. This is why doctors find it initially difficult to diagnose multiple sclerosis during its early stages.

Multiple sclerosis symptoms are also usually manifested by people between the ages of twenty and forty. Although multiple sclerosis can happen to anyone from any age, this is the common age range that is affected. Also, according to statistical research, the women are the ones who usually carry this debilitating disorder.

There is numbness or fatigue in one limb or both. This kind of weakness usually occurs on just one side of the body at a single time. However, there have been reports that it could happen to the entire bottom part of the body. This condition is often accompanied with a tingling sensation that is sometimes painful in some parts of the body.

There is also a partial or a complete visual loss which starts at one time then ends with having pain whenever both eyes move. This condition is given the medical term of optic neuritis. Apart from loss of vision, double vision or blurring of vision can also occur.

There could also be sensations like electrical shock that occur whenever the head is moved. Tremors also happen with the accompaniment of absence of coordination and imbalanced gait.

Many who have multiple sclerosis might experience relapses of the symptoms, especially during the early stages of the disorder. This relapsing phase is often followed by partial or complete remission.

Its causes

As minimally mentioned, multiple sclerosis is an autoimmune disease. This means that the body’s immune system attacks its own cells and tissues. The myelin, which is a protective wall that insulates the nerve fibers within, is damaged in multiple sclerosis. Once it is damaged, foreign substances that are potentially harmful can then freely destroy the open and unprotected nerve fibers.

Multiple sclerosis can happen to anyone from any age. However, it has been discovered that it usually occurs to people who are between twenty and forty years of age. As mentioned, women are also the ones who usually carry such disease. In fact, women are twice more likely to have multiple sclerosis than men.

As any other condition, heredity plays an important role. The risk of developing multiple sclerosis is greater for those who have a family history of the disease than for those who do not. If one of the parents has the disease, then there is a one to three percent possibility that multiple sclerosis may develop.

When it comes to identical twins, things are much more complicated and difficult to ascertain. Identical twins would mean having identical risks, according to some medical scientists. However, this is not the case because a twin who has multiple sclerosis only gives his or her identical twin a thirty percent possibility of having the very same disorder.