Update and questions

[yousyous8]

Hi everyone,

I hope you are all doing well.

In a previous post, I told you about my frustrations that my sister, after all these months, still hasn't got any treatment.

After meeting with 3 neurologists, each one after months and months of silence, the last doctor, who says he specializes in MS and does research on the subject, said that he's still not sure that it's MS even though she has many plaques and her LP confirmed it. He said the locations if her plaques are peculiar so he'd like to run more tests.

He said it could be a zinc deficiency that caused the formation of plaques. So he prescribed her zinc sulfate 30 mg/day and vitamin D 10,000 iu/day. He also asked her to do more blood tests.

My questions are:
- Can zinc deficiency cause plaques in the brain and cerebellum? After googling, it seems that zinc deficiency affects the brain and plays a major role in motor control.
Do you have any information on zinc and its impact on MS?
- Why are all these doctors taking their sweet time to diagnose her and give her appropriate treatment? Isn't it urgent to start a treatment as early as possible?

She seems to be doing fine now. Probably in remission though some symptoms linger such us incontinence or hand tremor. I hope she'll be alright. but this whole situation is incredibly frustrating.

I don't pretend to know more than the neurologist. But I would like them to give her a definitive answer and start a treatment. I believe that plaques + LP should confirm the presence of MS! Am I wrong? How could Zinc possibly help?
I would like to say though, that I'm quite happy he prescribe the 10,000 iu of vitamin D!

Thank you for reading.

Best wishes to all of you.

[yousyous8]

Thank you Alex for your reply. She has lesions on her optic nerve and spine. She also presents all the clinical symptoms. I don't know why they are dragging this. Today, she's doing even more blood tests (testing for HTLV among other things).

Also, does anyone know if zinc deficiency causes lesions and mimics MS symptoms?? I don't know what to think anymore! I want to trust that her doctor knows what he's doing.  

[HVAC]

She has to have attacks in at least two different locations in the brain, optic nerve, or spine at two different times. I had old damage so it took two years of being followed to be diagnosed with MS. I have Primary Progressive MS which takes a year after being diagnosed with MS to be diagnosed. PPMS does not have attacks you have symptoms that subtley get worse at the beginning towards the end it speeds up. The DMD drugs do not work as well for PPMS so it did not matter how long it took me to be diagnosed. I see my MS Specialist every two years. My major complaint is pain so he sent me to a pain specialist.

Alex