This Is MS Multiple Sclerosis Community: Knowledge & Support

..........and the need to work in a multidisciplinary environment.

As an example:

It is all very well for neurologists to be willing, for example to prescribe minocycline for people suffering from MS. They need to think carefully why they are doing it and seek advice from an expert in microbiology.

Most neurologists prescribing minocycline will be doing so because of its immunomodulatory powers, rather than its main use of stalling infection. They might be surprised at the number of people giving up the treatment because of the reactions they undergo. A microbiologist could explain that the Herxheimer reaction these people have been undergoing is due to the presence of chronic infection. Back in the nineteenth century, it was a common belief that MS had an infective cause, but this theory fell out of fashion because a definite infective agent could not be found.

Chlamydia pneumoniae was not discovered to be a pathogen until the 1980s. There might be many more pathogens still to be discovered.

Some people show a stronger Herxheimer reaction than others: I might well have given up the antibiotic route if I had not known what I might expect and been married to a consultant microbiologist who could talk me through it.

If minocycline is prescribed solely as an immunomodulant, then man people are going to give it up and the neurologist will just think that this just another treatment which does not really live up to its expectations.

Sarah