Help for Multiple Sclerosis?

Monday, Nov. 08, 1954

Doctors have learned to make no rash
claims about treatments for multiple
sclerosis. This baffling disease of
unknown origin afflicts an estimated
250,000 in the U.S. with varying
degrees of incapacity, usually in the
legs and arms, often involving speech
and vision. Damaging the nerve
sheaths in the brain and spinal
column, multiple sclerosis may take
many forms, from a quickly fatal attack
to a 30-year lingering illness
punctuated by long periods of relative
freedom. Histamine, vitamins and a
variety of drugs have aroused high
hopes in some researchers and their
patients, only to prove disappointing in
the long run.

Knowing this, Drs. John Kurtzke and
Louis Berlin jumped to no conclusions
when a multiple sclerosis patient,
treated with isoniazid for bed sores,
began to speak so that they could
again understand him. Instead, they
tested isoniazid, the TB wonder drug,
on 30 patients at the Veterans
Administration Hospital in the Bronx.
Three received no benefit, but 27
improved, and by a wider margin than
previous M.S. patients who had been
given other treatments. Most
encouraging was the fact that four
patients improved when they were
given the drug and relapsed when it
was stopped, then improved again
when it was resumed. Eight of the
patients have been followed for a year
or more since they left the hospital,
and none has had a new attack.
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Thanks for visiting!
During the course of research one day, I came across this article
published in Time Magazine and found it very interesting.  

In 52 years there has not been a lot of change, including the estimated
number of people in the U.S. with MS.  Note the dateline on the article:  
November 8, 1954
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