Anti-NMDA may explain some MS mental deficits

[MSUK]

Prematurely severe cognitive impairment in multiple sclerosis patients could be an effect of autoantibodies against the N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor complex, with natalizumab (Tysabri) withdrawal a potential contributor, a case report from Germany suggested.

In an MS patient who had to be confined to a nursing home at age 39 because of cognitive deficits amounting to dementia, immunoglobulin G-type antibodies to the NMDA receptor's NR1 subunit were found in cerebrospinal fluid samples, according to Klemens Ruprecht, MD, of Charité-Universitätsmedizin Berlin, and colleagues.

These autoantibodies are "the characteristic laboratory finding of anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis," they wrote online in JAMA Neurology..... Read More - http://www.ms-uk.org/cognition