Time to pop the champagne cork?

November 23, 2009 10:10 AM

Update on this fascinating thread, which discussed a controversial new treatment and theory about Multiple Sclerosis. Mainstream (Canadian) news agencies are now picking up the story: Article and video.

Interesting, impassioned debate in the comments on that article as well.

posted by Potomac Avenue to MetaFilter-Related at 10:10 AM (11 comments total)

If I didn't read mefi I never would have heard of this, much less understood what it could mean 6 months before the media reported about it. For those of who have or know someone who has MS, this is very big news, so I also want to say thanks to greatgifilte for posting it in the first place.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 10:14 AM on November 23, 2009

I just read that article this morning. It is a shame that like most treatments, it seems to only focus on relapsing-remitting. Well, not a shame for people with relapsing-remitting of course.
posted by Loto at 10:26 AM on November 23, 2009

Potomac Avenue: "impassioned debate in the comments"

Apricot seeds cure Cancer writes,"It is not surprising about the reaction from the MS societies in Canada and the U.S. These organisations have been bought and paid for by the big drug companies (BIG PHARMA) their main mission is to sell MORE drugs. Also they are not interested in finding a cure for any disease but rather to manage the symptoms. People should understand that it’s not about them, it’s about profits."


Medical research must ultimately be the most unrewarding thing in the world.
posted by boo_radley at 10:33 AM on November 23, 2009 [3 favorites]

I wish I had seen that FPP earlier. I watched the news segment on W5 earlier this week and was quite stunned. Thanks for pointing it to me. I'll pass the link on to a friend with MS. When she watched W5 she wanted to rush off and get scanned. Alas, no testing so far on the west coast of Canada. Still, hope. Amazing.
posted by beautifulcheese at 12:04 PM on November 23, 2009

I asked my neuro about this at my appointment a few weeks ago. His reaction? "Nonsense. We'd already know if that mattered." That was it, in its entirety. Yeah, great reasoning there, dude. Thanks for the respect, too.

Of course I finally got hold of his CV after that (the link had been broken before) and discovered the consultant fees and funding he's been getting from Glaxo and Bayer.

My neuro is fired.
posted by dilettante at 1:28 PM on November 23, 2009 [2 favorites]

This is sort of heartbreaking for me to find out about. I'll be visiting my uncle over Thanksgiving, and it will certainly be the last time I see him. He has advanced melanoma, and can't be treated for it, because he has had MS for years, and the cancer treatment would certainly kill him before the cancer would, although that's not saying much, seeing as back in May they gave him a month to live.

Oh well. I shouldn't be saddened by this news, but heartened by it. Any new development in the fight against MS means that one less person may have to experience what my uncle is.
posted by Astro Zombie at 2:11 PM on November 23, 2009

It is always amazing when new research upsets the apple cart. Especially when the apple cart is based on less sound research than the new stuff. Will be very glad for humanity if this works out to be even one of the causes.
posted by gjc at 4:18 PM on November 23, 2009

Medical research must ultimately be the most unrewarding thing in the world.

I wouldn't say that.

"Dr. Zamboni's wife, Elena, has undergone a battery of scans and neurological tests and her multiple sclerosis is, for all intents and purposes, gone.

“This is probably the best prize of the research,” he said. "
posted by cmgonzalez at 8:32 PM on November 23, 2009 [1 favorite]

I asked my neuro about this at my appointment a few weeks ago. His reaction? "Nonsense. We'd already know if that mattered." That was it, in its entirety. Yeah, great reasoning there, dude. Thanks for the respect, too.

This is why we can't have good things. I wish doctors (and my fellow medical students) would realize that medicine is just like any other science -- fundamentally human. Everything we know is built on the work of other, fallible humans. We can miss things, we can be wrong about things, but more importantly, we can correct our earlier mistakes and replace faulty lines of thinking with new, more correct ones. (Paging Thomas Kuhn!)

Anyway, I'm glad to see the media giving this some well-deserved attention.
posted by greatgefilte at 4:28 AM on November 24, 2009

This feels like Christmas!
posted by Mike Mongo at 6:37 AM on November 24, 2009

Astro Zombie, so sorry. I hope you have a warm and meaningful visit with your uncle.
posted by madamjujujive at 12:57 PM on November 24, 2009