This Is MS Multiple Sclerosis Knowledge & Support Community

Not that we're entering forbidden territory but, under a different pretense, we are entering territory researchers have been struggling with for many years. "What starts (this phase of) the MS disease process and what drives it's continuance?"

When (not "if") we answer that on thisisms I'm in for an even split of the royalties. Not because I intend to have any meaningful input, but because I'm a nice guy and because I otherwise won't be able to afford to replace the shiny shirts Ian gives me so much grief about.

Long ago, cancer researchers realized an increased degree of success against terminal Leukemia by not only killing the cancerous cells in the blood but by killing and replacing the bone marrow which had gotten into the mode of creating those cancer cells.

Researchers were aware that the MS process involves aberrant white blood cells and at some point MS researchers, not knowing at what stage of the creation/replication process the aberrant MS were created/driven (I think) they assumed that, like leukemia, aberrant MS cells were created in the bone marrow and any hope to realize positive results against MS would also require eliminating all the white blood cells and the bone marrow.

Due in equal amounts to the fortunes of fate and researcher skills, it was found, or at this point "seems" to have been found that "only" eliminating the white blood cells to grow back (hopefully/seemingly) without the continuance of the MS process is actually far less risky for the patient and more effective than additionally killing and "re-seeding" the bone marrow.

What lessons might that taught us about what starts and continues the MS disease process? At this point I don't think it tells us anything with certainty about where or when the disease process starts, but "IF" long term Campath/HDC (Revimmune) results are seen, I think it obviously shows that the bone marrow isn't responsible for the continuance of the MS process and seems to invite us to focus our attention (I wish I knew more about this subject) to the thymus, where the white cells mature, and the meiosis (cell division) process.

Input welcome, but that's how the subject has always seemed to me.

Bob

Hi NHE,

Sometimes the answer lies in knowing what you are searching for. I had not used adoptive transfer as a key word. I added site:edu and site:gov to your Google search. The site:gov produced what I was looking for. This search showed that other autoimmune diseases had been adoptively transferred to a new host in the animal model.

At this point, I feel that anyone with an autoimmune disease should not donate blood.

As for question number 2 -- bone marrow donation, I feel that it is a risk verses benefit choice. The odds of a bone marrow match are pretty high; I believe in the 5-figure range. If a patient receives bone marrow from someone with MS (or any autoimmune disease), the WBCs produced by the new marrow have the potential to be triggered and cause the recipient to develop the autoimmune disease. This question might be answered by the cyclophosphamide trials at Stony Brook.

At this point, I think I have my answer. I will not donate blood or bone marrow, but I will leave organ donor on my drivers license. Should I meet an untimely demise, I will let someone else decide what is the risk in using one of my organs.

IHaveMS-com wrote:At this point, I feel that anyone with an autoimmune disease should not donate blood.

Hi Tim,

First, I agree with your mindset.

I do have to wonder what would be transferred in the blood to start/recipricate the MS process since EVERYONE seems to have myelin reactive T cells and it might be said that MS is the failure to control the numbers of those T cells.

Additionally, Cambridge researchers think that the myelin reactive T cells NOT dying at the time of their pre-programmed time of death might be the problem or part of the problem. Again, what might be causing that?

Remember, I'm in for an even split!

Bob

Lyon wrote:...and the meiosis (cell division) process

I think that you meant to say mitosis which is the process of cell division in somatic cells. The process of meiosis produces haploid cells and only occurs with germ line cells, i.e., to produce eggs and sperm.

NHE

NHE wrote:I think that you meant to say mitosis. The process of meiosis produces haploid cells and only occurs with germ line cells, i.e., to produce eggs and sperm.

Thank you NHE, you are correct, that is what I meant to say.

I HATE to tell you how long ago school was and in the meantime (LOTS of meantime) I forgot which was which (meiosis/mitosis).
Bob