Doctors are moving closer to being able to diagnose multiple sclerosis using a simple blood test, allowing for earlier intervention against a disease that is often hard to identify. MS is an unpredictable disorder of the central nervous system brought about by the immune system’s attacking of myelin, the substance that insulates nerves and speeds electrical conduction of nerve signals.

The disease affects an estimated 250,000 people in the United States, typically appearing in young adults. As with other autoimmune diseases, it is more likely to strike women than men.

In some people, the disease either slowly or rapidly leads to severe disability. For others, there are cycles of attacks and remission. And depending on which nerve fibers are affected, patients can experience problems ranging from weakness and clumsiness to numbness, visual problems, and even mood and cognitive changes.

Often patients will experience a single neurological event that hints of MS, but then be symptom-free for months or even years.

Yet clinical diagnosis and start of treatment requires a person having at least two events that suggest inflammation and loss of myelin, along with magnetic resonance imaging that can spot brain lesions and lab testing that usually requires drawing spinal fluid.

“MRI is an expensive tool that we might be able to avoid if a blood test can be developed for MS,” said Dr. Jagannadha Avasarala, an assistant professor of neurology at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center and lead researcher for a new study reported in the March issue of the Journal of Molecular Neuroscience.

“In some patients, it is difficult to conclusively diagnose MS. There is probably not a single marker to detect MS. This test was designed to look for a pattern of individual proteins that can differentiate people with MS from healthy people,” he added.

In the study, the researchers compared blood samples from 25 patients newly diagnosed with MS with blood samples from 25 healthy people to see if there was a distinct pattern of proteins and peptides in those with MS.

“In this preliminary investigation, we found a distinct pattern in the MS group that revealed the existence of three markers (proteins) for the disease,” Avasarala said. “This could allow us to identify the earliest changes that represent MS and help in diagnosis.”

Study participants had relapsing-remitting MS, which is the most common form. They were not taking any medications for MS. Their mean age was 29; the healthy participants’ was 28.

A similar “fingerprint” for the disease based on two of the same proteins was described by Austrian scientists in 2003, based on analysis of blood samples of 103 patients who had experienced a neurological event suggestive of MS and a positive test from spinal fluid.

Patients with antibodies against the two proteins tended to experience a second MS-like attack significantly earlier than those without the antibodies.

Avasarala is now collaborating with a company called Predictive Diagnostics, based in Vacaville, Calif., that has developed a new protein analysis array with special software to recognize protein patterns.

Copyright © 2003 Medical World Communications, Inc. All rights reserved.