2006 Multiple Sclerosis Walk-a-thon

[SuperClerk]

<p>Hey all.</p><p>My son's boy scout troop is taking part in the 2006 Multiple Sclerosis Walk-a-thon. It is a 12 mile walk that helps the Multiple Sclerosis Society. Last year, a lot of came through with donations for them and I'd like to ask for help once again this year.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Here is the link-</p><p><a href="http://msnyc.kintera.org/faf/search/searchTeamPart.asp?ievent=144568&lis=1&kntae144568=0BF25FE5EC514C71BB05CAD1801B57F6&team=1260239">http://msnyc.kintera.org/faf/search/searchTeamPart.asp?ievent=144568&amp;lis=1&amp;kntae144568 =0BF25FE5EC514C71BB05CAD1801B57F6&amp;team=1260239</a></p><p>Any help would be greatly appreciated.</p><p>Thanks!</p>

[Reephdweller]

Not to be mean or anything or to make light of it, but what's up with the &quot;multiple&quot; sclerosis anyway? Are the singular sclerosis easier to cure?

[Billy Staples]

<strong>Reefdweller</strong> wrote:<br />Not to be mean or anything or to make light of it, but what's up with the &quot;multiple&quot; sclerosis anyway? Are the singular sclerosis easier to cure? <p>sclerosis is a fancy name for scars.&nbsp; these particular scars appear in the brain, brain stem, medulla oblongotta and C1-C7 of the Spinal cord.&nbsp; I believe.&nbsp; there are many other reason to have lesions (scars) thats what they are called in the brain, lesions.&nbsp; So the Sclerosis, scars or lesion can appear anywhere in your brain.If they are usually found to be periventricular to the ventrical in the brain center leading to the brain stem</p><p>&nbsp; If it is MS, which is a disease of which there isn't 1 standard test for, rather one in which mostly you have to rule out everything else it could be, lyme disease, lupus, HIV, syphilis,basically almost any autoimmune disease lesions appear.&nbsp; For some unknown reason a body starts attacking itself, when it discovers for example a lesion and the body starts attacking as a foreign body.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Ms Affects many different people in many ways.&nbsp; A lot of it depends on the location of the lesions, which can be scattered. For r example if the lesions are in the back of your brain, the part sticking out just above the cerebellum in the rear, that is partially the occipital lobe which would affect your eyesight, leading to possible&nbsp; Optical Neuritis. Your hearing center is back there also and may affect your hearing .&nbsp; balance centers dizziness are all part of lesions in that are, so as diverse as each area of the brain is, so are the symptoms you can have with MS</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>MS has 4 grades.....the most common and least dangerous of the 4 if 'relapse remitting'.&nbsp; Which if you watch West Wing, that is the type of MS that Martin Sheen had.&nbsp; Some people by looking at the you wouldn't even know have MS.&nbsp; I will mention a few only because they have been open with it.&nbsp; Richard PRYOR, HIS WAS VERY OBVIOUS CAUSE THEY CAUGHT IT VERY LATE.&nbsp; THE EARLIER YOU CATCH THE BETTER YOUR CHANCES.</p><p>Neil Cavuto - Journalist, I think its Fox news</p><p>Lena Horne</p><p>Teri Garr</p><p>Annette Funicello</p><p>and unbelievably <a href="http://www.htinet.com/celeb/lander/lander1.html">David &quot;Squiggy&quot; Lander</a> .....who said that during an interview he didn't want to producers and execs of Laverne and Shirley to know he was sick, he kept coming to work and doing the best he could.&nbsp; Unfortunately one of the things affecting was his sense of balance, walking, dizziness and they accused him of drinking before work and knock it off.&nbsp; well He couldn't ;'knock it off and wound up getting fired from a hit TV show for people thinking he was drunk when in reality he was suffering from MS and was too ashamed to tell anyone!</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Billy</p>

[Billy Staples]

<p>Help me outhere...I cant walk the 12 miles rightnow, so how doews it work and we do we 'support' someone?</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>how oes it work, how do we do it, Like denzel Washington in Philadelphia...talk to me like I'm a 2 year old!</p><p>Thanks</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Billy</p>

[spoon]

<p>Hey Superclerk,</p><p>I wasn't sure who you wanted us to make our donation under so I did it as a general donation for $50.&nbsp; I'm not sure if I can have my name listed, but if so I may be able to get a bunch of donations for you under it from a ton of my friends and family.&nbsp; I'll&nbsp;try anyway, but let me know asap.&nbsp; I'll send my personal email address to you via pm so you can let me know.&nbsp; Hope this helps you out and good luck.&nbsp; This stuff is really nice to see and I think the Ron/fez.net peeps should help out SC here even if it's only in $5 pledges.&nbsp; Hell, it's set up for paypal and credit cards.&nbsp; Let's step up for a great cause as this shitty disease needs&nbsp;to be better understood and finally put to rest.&nbsp; </p><p>Good luck man.&nbsp; </p>

[suggums]

<p> </p><strong>spoon</strong> wrote:<br /><p>Hey Superclerk,</p><p>I wasn't sure who you wanted us to make our donation under so I did it as a general donation for $50. I'm not sure if I can have my name listed, but if so I may be able to get a bunch of donations for you under it from a ton of my friends and family. I'll try anyway, but let me know asap. I'll send my personal email address to you via pm so you can let me know. Hope this helps you out and good luck. This stuff is really nice to see and I think the Ron/fez.net peeps should help out SC here even if it's only in $5 pledges. Hell, it's set up for paypal and credit cards. Let's step up for a great cause as this shitty disease needs to be better understood and finally put to rest. </p><p>Good luck man. </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>&quot;He's the factory's bad-ass mail clerk with a heart of gold. He donates half of his paychecks to orphans. Orphans with diseases.&quot; </p><p>It's setup for paypal so i'll match spoons. i have an aunt with ms.<br /></p>

<span class=post_edited>This message was edited by suggums on 4-18-06 @ 2:31 AM</span>

[spoon]

<p>Look at Billy Staples, M.D.!!&nbsp; Nice write up, but one thing you may have misrepresented is that the body does in fact attack itself, but&nbsp;not the actually lesions.&nbsp; The said lesions or&nbsp;plaques are the result of the body attack a specific&nbsp;protein involved in our nervous system.&nbsp; It is believed that our immune system somehow&nbsp;views proteins called&nbsp;myelin that surround and protect the nerve fibers in the brain, spinal cord and specifically the optic nerve as foreign&nbsp;invaders or antigens. When myelin becomes&nbsp;inflamed or is destroyed&mdash;this is called demyelination&mdash;the result is an interruption in the normal flow of nerve impulses through the central nervous system which can cause the symptoms that Billy described and have many more awful results. The process of demyelination and subsequent disruption of nerve impulse flow is the disease known as MS.&nbsp; Injured tissue called lesions or plaques form in areas of demyelination.&nbsp; On the brain, these plaques show up in MRIs&nbsp;and are&nbsp;the result of such actions.&nbsp; Over time, patients lose more and more functioning nerves within the brain and spinal cord which ultimately can lead to death and almost always has crippling effects.&nbsp; </p><p>While there is no cure for MS, medications can reduce the number, frequency, and severity of relapses and may slow the progression of the disease. Starting treatment as soon as MS is diagnosed can prevent or delay permanent damage to the nervous system.</p><p>Here's some info on the main meds used out there for MS right now:</p><p>1)&nbsp; The interferon beta medications resemble the natural interferon the body produces during a response by the&nbsp;immune system&nbsp;to disease. It is not completely clear how interferon beta medications work in people with <a href="javascript:AddNavBar('../health_guide_atoz/stm159615.asp');">multiple sclerosis (MS)</a>, but it is known that they affect the immune system and also help fight <a href="javascript:AddNavBar('../health_guide_atoz/stv15687.asp');">viral infections</a>. They also work by preventing <a href="javascript:AddNavBar('../health_guide_atoz/sti150782.asp');">inflammation</a> and <a href="javascript:AddNavBar('../health_guide_atoz/std16468.asp');">demyelination</a> in the <a href="javascript:AddNavBar('../health_guide_atoz/stc123713.asp');">central nervous system</a>.</p><p>The interferon beta medications also limit the activity of gamma interferon, which is a <a href="javascript:AddNavBar('../health_guide_atoz/stp1987.asp');">protein</a> produced by the immune system that worsens MS.</p><p>Interferon beta and glatiramer acetate suppress or alter the activity of the immune system. This treatment is based on evidence that MS is an&nbsp;autoimune disease&nbsp;that results when there is an abnormal response by the immune system that causes it to attack normal tissues&mdash;in this case, the myelin coating that surrounds nerve fibers.&nbsp; </p><p>2)&nbsp; Glatiramer acetate (formerly known as copolymer-1) is an artificial <a href="javascript:AddNavBar('../health_guide_atoz/stp1987.asp');">protein</a> that resembles a natural myelin protein. It is not known exactly how the medication works, but it may help people who have <a href="javascript:AddNavBar('../health_guide_atoz/stm159615.asp');">multiple sclerosis (MS)</a> by preventing the body's <a href="javascript:AddNavBar('../health_guide_atoz/sti150867.asp');">immune system</a> from attacking the myelin coating that protects nerve fibers.</p>

[spoon]

<p>Sugs, you need to hit SC's link and donate via the general donation link or tab unless you know his name or kid's name to donate under.&nbsp; </p>

[Billy Staples]

<p>Spoon</p><p>I agree, you are 100% correct ,but you explained that part a million times better.</p><p>the only thing I would add is this myelin that we talk about and that gets destroyed is a sheath around the neuron, protecting it.&nbsp; My doctor likened it to the plastic coating covering a wire.&nbsp; In effect not in materials, of course</p><p>what makes it even so more difficult is that MS is not the only disease or symptom that has demyelinatin it it.&nbsp; It can be a long, difficult and agonizing process taking years just to get a proper diagnosis. There's always the chance it's wrong too as it involves a lot of if it isn't this, it may be this,OK its not that, lets try this and so on....till in some cases all thats left is MS that hasn't been ruled out.</p><p>Certain procedures can check for demyelination and they aren't pleasant.&nbsp; The worse I have had, 2 times, once in an office where it wouldn't insert and finally in a hospital where they could watch the needle go into your lower spine interior. I called a spinal tap, of for those who don't want the band jokes a lumbar fusion.&nbsp; It can tell alot if its Lyme or MS by proteins and IGG bands</p><p>yours Dr. spoon...and no cutting and pasting, this is a medical professional discussion.&nbsp; no outside reference material should be necessary</p><p>All you Dr. spoon</p><p>Questions!!!</p><p>picture of a brain withan unidnetified lesion...look for arrow</p><p><img height="468" src="http://brain.hastypastry.net/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=5454&d=1103775418" width="508" border="0" /></p><p><span class="post_edited">anotherone</span></p><p><span class="post_edited"><img height="454" src="http://brain.hastypastry.net/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=5455&d=1103775523" width="520" border="0" /></span></p><p><span class="post_edited">same thing different view, harder to see...look for white dots at approximately 2, 6 and 9'O'clocks</span></p><p><span class="post_edited"><img height="551" src="http://brain.hastypastry.net/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=5456&d=1103775948" width="438" border="0" /></span></p>

<span class=post_edited>This message was edited by Billy Staples on 4-19-06 @ 2:57 AM</span>

[spoon]

<p>The spinal tap is surely no fun.&nbsp; And webmd is our friend Billy, hence the blue underlined text!&nbsp; Yet I do know a lot since a family member suffers from MS.</p>

[Billy Staples]

<p>Actually, the cut and paste part was the unly part not serious.&nbsp; Unfortuantely, wenever learn about a lot of these things until it hits close to home</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>once again, I concur ( sounds good like that)</p>

[SuperClerk]

Thanks a bunch you guys!!!! You have no idea how much it's appreciated!!!!

[SuperClerk]

<font size="2">Well, the boy scouts had to shorten the walk due to the horrible weather we had in NYC. But all of the donations were still sent. <br />&nbsp;<br />Thanks again to all who helped out. It is greatly appreciated</font>