Banding

[itslucky3]

I am a 27 year old girl from Calgary. I have had a wide range of symptoms numbness, weakness, fatigue, eye trouble(loss of range in 1 eye and patches of blurriness that come and go), sharp shocks of pain around my body, bowel trouble from urgency to constipation, and chest pain/pressure This has been going on for about 1.5 years.  My GP has run lots of tests and has come up with nothing. I have seen 2 neurologists but they have not come up with anything.  I have had MRI, ECG, and every blood test you could think of all normal.  My ophthalmologist has discovered a loss of vision in 1 eye and a swollen nerve in that eye as well.   The chest pain is my most constant symptom.  It was very strong for the first 2 weeks but since them has been with me all the time sometimes stronger than others.  Nothing seems to set if off, and it is not worse when I exercise.  I have had a suspicion of MS for a while but my MRI is clean and both neurologists have said the chest pain/pressure is not related in any way to the other symptoms.  I have asked them about a MS symptom called banding and they are not aware of this as an MS symptom.  This symptom is also not on any MS official websites but allot of private ones.  What is the real story about banding?

[CCF-Neuro-M.D.-JT]

In medical terms, we call it a "band-like sensation" whereas I've heard it referred to by patients as the MS Hug.  This is the feeling that MS or transverse myelitis patients with spinal cord involvement get in which it feels like there's a tight band or girdle that typically goes all the way around their chest/waist/trunk.  It's a common complaint that we've seen many times in the hospital and outpatient setting and it's well described in the medical literature.  It's usually seen with brand new presentations of MS or transverse myelitis or can also be seen in chronic MS patients who have a new plaque in the spinal cord. Hope that clears things up.

[amberp]

Sounds like some of the probs I had. Diagnosed with MS many times before I was diagnosed with lyme disease.  Lots of MS symptoms, clean spinal tap, clean MRI. "unusual case" of MS they said.  So it might be worth checking out.  Make sure you go to a lyme literate medical doc (LLMD).  An LLMD will know to do a Western Blot for chronic (IgG) and acute (IgM)lyme.  Some labs are even preferred.  But just check out lymenet.org.  There's a list of symptoms, some more unique to lyme.  Worth checking out.  Especially cuz there's treatment for it.

[sassylassy]

People with MS call the banding feeling the "MS hug".  If you go to MSWorld forum where you can post questions, comments and answers and do a search for MS hug you will find much info on it.

I think you could probably do just a search online and find a little about it.