In the modern era of 2018, with our highly effective disease modifying therapies, we now see large minorities of patients (upwards of 41% of patients in some clinical trials) who manifest “confirmed disability improvements” or CDI (I’ll post a link to a CDI video I did a few months back below). CDI is defined as IMPROVING on the disability scale we use in MS (called the expanded disability status scale, or EDSS) by at least 1 point and maintained for at least 6 months. WOW!
Several symptomatic therapies IMPROVE functional outcomes in MS. In this video we touch on treatments for heat sensitivity and motor fatigue, pathologic fatigue and cognitive impairments, severe spasticity and depression. There is evidence amongst all these treatment that they can improved function in some patients.
I share 3 patient anecdotes from my clinic of improvements I’ve witnessed 1st hand (and I could share a hundred more but that would make one insanely long video!).
I also include 2 calls to action! The 1st is for people living with MS or their loved ones. I ask that you write in the comments about YOUR experience with some form of improvements please. Share with me!! The 2nd call to action is for MS providers. I ask that you start not only asking patients “any new neurological symptoms? Anything gotten worse” but I also want you to start asking “has anything gotten better?” Since starting to ask this question in clinic I’m amazing at the exciting things I hear.
There you have it, “the MS Improvement Project”. Please share you experiences, opinions, questions and your comments below!
Now, Please