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Tunnel vision, or, "is it brains or veins"?

Posted: Tue Aug 06, 2013 4:47 am
by 1eye
I guess I have spent too long in the CCSVI forum without checking back here. Please keep that in mind, while I theorize? :smile: And please don't think I necessarily have a lot in common with, or that I think I am worse off than, anybody else. :smile:

I might put every "MS" symptom I can think of down to not being able to walk more than half a block, without: 1) wearing myself out -- muscle fatigue 2) getting overheated. This sedentary lifestyle is tolerable as long as I am sitting down, but very bad for my health. It seems I cannot use the largest muscles in my body for very long. I have been that way, slowly increasingly, since before my diagnosis.

I was diagnosed RR"MS". My diagnosis took place about 15 years after my first "incident", back in 1982. Dx was in 1997, when I had 5 more years of working life, 7-9 more years before it magically changed to SP"MS". By 10 years, I was using a walker full time, but unable to walk more than a block very well, and they took away my driver's license within another year. Since 2005 or so I could not get DMDs. a) I can't get rid of heat and b) I get massive muscle fatigue in my legs and back.

It isn't long, I think, after not walking a while, before big disabilities begin.

I think I might say everything else is secondary to not being able to be upright, and not seated, without getting too tired. I might say that that is secondary to getting overheated more and more through the years. Even that could be secondary to not having good enough veins to distribute, and lose, heat, more and more over the 16 years since they shared my dx with me.

It is not enough to say I have to chill myself. I need to be in air, above a very similar temperature as well. That air temperature, at which I become increasingly uncomfortable, and start to fall apart, is pretty constant. It is not measurable with a fever thermometer. I think in my case, it's temperature regulation of my brain that is the most broken. That might be secondary to degradation of my ability to drain my brain, and possibly my spinal cord too. I think past a certain elapsed time it becomes, not irreversible, let's just say that, increasingly, the road back gets longer than the time I have available to travel it.

Three digits of accuracy (1 part in a thousand) on every fever thermometer that's existed in my lifetime. Even in electronics, that's more than you need, much of the time.

One neurologist told me I was "grasping at straws". I think I am trying to get out of a haystack.

Has anybody reported a treatment making them more temperature tolerant, and not improved their ability to use their legs/back, either better, or longer?

Re: Tunnel vision, or, "is it brains or veins"?

Posted: Tue Aug 06, 2013 8:33 am
by HappyPoet
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Re: Tunnel vision, or, "is it brains or veins"?

Posted: Tue Aug 06, 2013 8:34 pm
by 1eye
No, no, I don't think I said I sweat. I just get too hot. The palms of my hands feel like they're burning. I did sweat from an angina attack. For me, too much sweating is a very bad sign and is not associated with heat, or even "MS". I also have a washed-out colour in my face when my when my heart gets unhappy. Fortunately this has only happened once since 2009, when I had a real attack.

Heck, I don't even sweat when I am tricycling in the sun. I think sweating can be a problem brought on by too much heat, but only in people that sweat. It all may come down too autonomic nerves. I don't know.

I wear a cooling bandana-like device around my neck. It holds water, so it is like my neck is sweating, when it isn't. I can tricycle in the sun, fast enough to create a cooling breeze. I wear a do-rag on my head, that I also wet. When it dries out, I overheat, so I spray it down with a water-bottle when necessary.

Sometimes when the temperature is too high, it will suddenly occur to me to go take a look at the thermometer. I will find that I am out of the safe zone, and realize that that is why I have been feeling so lousy. I need to adjust the thermostat! Feeling so crappy goes away once I've cooled down.

I used to sweat, back when I could walk.

Re: Tunnel vision, or, "is it brains or veins"?

Posted: Wed Aug 07, 2013 8:19 am
by HappyPoet
Sorry that I misunderstood. Hopefully, you'll get some proper replies.

Re: Tunnel vision, or, "is it brains or veins"?

Posted: Tue Aug 27, 2013 8:58 pm
by Cece
http://jap.physiology.org/content/101/5/1481.full
Brain temperature is maintained by CBF, which serves as a body-coupled heat exchanger system penetrating all brain structures. Data presented herein quantitatively validate the manner in which CBF protects against extracranial cooling via the temperature shielding effect. It is often assumed that cerebral metabolism is responsible for maintaining brain temperature. However, according to Eq. 2 cerebral metabolism can only change brain temperature, compared with the temperature of incoming arterial blood, by the quantity Tm. Accordingly, for hematocrit level of 40% and arterial blood oxygen saturation of 100%, the maximum effect of metabolism on brain temperature cannot exceed 0.9°C even if all delivered oxygen is consumed [oxygen extraction fraction (OEF) = 1]. In practice, OEF rarely exceeds 40%, which results in a 0.3–0.4°C increase in brain temperature compared with that of incoming blood (32). Experimental measurements of arterial-venous temperature difference in monkeys (9) and humans (19) agree with this prediction. Small animals normally have higher metabolic rates compared with large animals. But this does not significantly affect brain temperature because more efficient heat removal is provided by higher CBF, the dominant effect in temperature regulation. Thus cerebral metabolic activity does not markedly affect brain temperature, and, indeed, it has been reported that patients in whom cerebral metabolism was reduced to 55% of normal did not show a larger brain-rectal temperature difference (15). A corollary is that body temperature is the primary determinant of deep brain temperature. Our experimental data demonstrate that deep brain temperature in rats under our experimental conditions is slightly (<1°C) lower than the deep body temperature.
Yeah I don't know. Maybe this is helpful?
I think it is brains and veins that are the problem.
Autonomic nervous system dysfunction can cause the dysregulation of temperature. MS damage can cause dysregulation of temperature. Poor cerebral blood flow and CSF flow can cause dysregulation of temperature. Get all three happening in the same body, and the body might cry uncle.
Has anybody reported a treatment making them more temperature tolerant, and not improved their ability to use their legs/back, either better, or longer?
This was your question, and I have no experience with this and cannot answer.