I had my first infusion yesterday at the Royal London hospital. I experienced no side effects whatsoever. It took nearly five hours to complete the infusion (600ml commencing with 30ml/hour, increasing by an extra 30 ml/hour every thirty minutes, the titration was slowed for a while due to lowish blood pressure)...

I'm new on these forums, having just received a probable dx of MS (still need MRI) this week. I don't know much about Rituximab as a treatment for MS, but my 15yo son has been in a TrialNet study for the past two years in which they have studied it with new Type 1 diabetes patients. The results have been very, very promising!

Seems as though every time I get infused with methylprednisone (recently had 3 day course), or when I was getting cytoxan + methylprednisone, a day or two after the infusions I experience absolutely horrible bladder problems, to the point of straight up incontinence (or having to use bathroom every 5-10 minutes). Has anyone else experienced this? Any suggestions? Haven't had any luck researching it online. Thanks.

I was going through the clinical trials list and saw that Ocrelizumab is, or is still recruiting for phase 2. I'm wondering if this is really just Rituxan with a more complicated name or is this a way to get around the financial loss of a soon to expire patent on Rituxan? They must have tweaked it more than just the name.
Lars

Are there any others out there with RRMS that have taken Rituxan? or is it just me? curious as to what others experiences have been.

Thanks in advance :)

I didn't see this posted so.... here it is. Question, how does Rituximab differ from the other monoclonal antibodies such as Campath and Tysabri?
Thanks Lars

Rituximab
Breaking News from Dr. Vollmer

In the development of new therapies for multiple sclerosis, there are occasions in which the results of a study surprise investigators and challenge their long-held beliefs about MS. A recent example is the evolving story concerning the development of a drug called rituximab ...

Here's an abstract from a study that will be presented at the upcoming American Academy of Neurology meetings in April.

In simple terms, it found that Rituxan appeared to impede the progression of PPMS in male patients under the age of 51 who had enhancing lesions.

Unfortunately, I am a male patient with PPMS under the age of 51 who does not have enhancing lesions, and Rituxan has done nothing for me.

At any rate, ...

I hope this can help others decide whether or not to try Rituxan. Perhaps I did not make the right choice.

Three weeks ago, I had my first infusion of Rituxan; I decided to discontinue the treatment. This is what happened:

I had no reaction for the first 72 hours or so (I had the drug on a Thurs.). I awakened Sunday morning with nausea, and severe dizziness (worse than my usual vertigo). My right ...

For both RevImmune and Campath, you read about the surprising / unexpected decreases in EDSS. Has anything similar been noted for Rituxan?

I checked what I think are the Phase II results, and they present the starting EDSS but not what it was at the end.

got my blood test results back today, and Rituxan has done what it was supposed to do, my B cell counts have indeed plummeted.

Now let's see if this has any beneficial effect on my MS. Sure hope so...