Re: I.B.M.

Posted By L.G. on January 27, 1999 at 13:24:28:

In Reply to: Re: I.B.M. posted by CCF neuro MD MM on January 26, 1999 at 15:23:56:






I was wondering if there was currently a treatment for inclusion body myositis. Also is the muscle loss from the wasting irreversible? I've had several tests including a muscle biopsy, but nothing has shown up yet. At this pointI'm throwing my hands to the sky.



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Treatment of inclusion body myositis is difficult and the therapies like
steroid therapy and drugs which suppress the immune system which work in
similar muscle diseases have met with little success.
One treatment which has been shown to be successful in some but not all
cases is intravenous immumngloblin therapy.
This treatmet does not help every patient but a degree of improvment
can be shown in some cases by means of serial muscle strength testing.
Definite clinically obvious improvement has also been experienced by some
patients.
It is unfortunately not possible to predict which patients will respond to
therapy, but it is worth a trial in any individual case.