A RADICAL treatment can halt progress of aggressive multiple sclerosis and even reverse its symptoms, a groundbreaking study has shown.
The treatment, which wipes out and then renews the immune system, was tested on 24 patients in Canada over 13 years.
During that time not one relapsed, while in 70 per cent of cases progression stopped and 40 per cent saw lasting reversal of symptoms.
MS affects the brain and spinal cord, and can cause paralysis.
Doctors harvested stem cells from patients’ bone marrow and froze them before destroying the immune system with chemo drugs. The cells were then transplanted back to the body to form a new immune system with no “memory” of attacking the brain.
Trial volunteer Jennifer Molson was diagnosed in 1996 at 21 and received the treatment in 2002.
She said: “I was unable to talk or work and was in assisted care. Now I’m able to walk independently, live in my own home and work full-time. I was also able to get married, walk down the aisle with my dad and dance with my husband. I’ve even gone skiing.”
Dr Harold Atkins, of the University of Ottawa, said: “Our trial is the first to show the complete, long-term suppression of all inflammatory activity in people with MS. This is very exciting.”
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But he warned it was risky, and only likely to benefit patients in the early stages of the illness.
Dr Emma Gray of the Multiple Sclerosis Society UK said of the research: “It holds a lot of promise for people with certain types of MS.”
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