Does a normal brain MRI mean NO XMRV?

[roma]

Lesions on the brain are the hallmark symptom of MS. I didn't show any when I had an MRI with contrast when my CFS acutely onset 4 years ago. My brother and sister both have MS- so I will be having another MRI soon to rule it out again.

i have read that atypical MS might be linked to XMRV as well, im starting to think that all fibro,MS,CFS,ME, Autism are all due to some virus the problem is that there are too many of them out there for us to know hopefully in the near future the FDA will look into designing a viro chip like the one they used to identify XMRV on the prostate cancer samples even the guy who invented the viro chip said that he would have never thought it would be a MLV virus when he found it he said he would've never looked there and if it wasn't because the viro chip picked it up we would never even know it can infect humans... i think a lot of it too has to do with which specialist you are seeing or you are referred to, one might say is MS one may say it's something else when in reality it could be a virus, maybe a lot of people have XMRV but for some reason affects some more then others and that's when different diagnosis are made

 

[roma]

that's what i thought too, i have seen many CFS cases where people have abnormal MRIs, that's why people have cognitive problems because the virus is in the brain and i really think we don't need a science paper to realize that XMRV in fact does infect the brain the evidence is compelling..

 

[roma]

Atypical MS is now being linked to XMRV as well, i went to an MS forum and started reading up on symptoms and a lot of them are very similar and close to CFS symptoms i think they should look into it more maybe it's just they same dang virus but in some people infects some parts and other parts in others and that's when the different diagnosis are made, when i first started getting sick about six months ago i went to many doctors and specialist and they only two things they found was inflammation and brain demyalination, i know inflammation is very common in CFS and brain demyalination ocurrs the following weeks after your brain has a viral invasion, and the first possible diagnosis was MS even though i kept tellining my doctor it was something i caught after my condom broke when having sex he is still to this day convinced that it might be MS which is why im seeing a neurologist next week after they rule it out( because i know they will) i will tell them to start me on some antivirals or antiretroviral and see what happens, it really sucks that many many people out there are being misdiagnosed and they keep giving them the wrong medication to treat some of the symptoms and letting the disease progress, when in reality all they probably need to better their lives are some antiretrovirals.

 

[Recovery Soon]

They may be the hallmark symptom of MS but after seeing 2 different MS specialists (neurologists), both ruled out (85% certain) MS for me syaing that my brain lesions were in the 'wrong place' - not typically the same areas of the brain where the lesions in MS appear. I do have a lot of MS symptoms though.

I'd get a 3rd opinion.

 

[WillowJ]

Sometimes a "normal" test means... that it doesn't indicate any disease the doctor knows about. So the MRI could have ME lesions which have a particular pattern and are in a different area from MS lesions, and the doctor might say it is "normal" if s/he isn't paying attention to the fact that there might be diseases unknown.

I have several symptoms which could be consistent with MS but not much single-sided weakness, and not full paralysis or total loss of feeling.

 

[pamb]

Way back in 2004 a neurologist at U of Calgary, Canada, saw a lot of small 'focal points' I think he called them on my husband's brain. Lots of tiny white spots. they had some discussion about it, and since my husband raced bicycles for 50 years, and certainly had many falls in that time, they put it down to either normal aging (though a bit much for his age) or damage from the falls from the bike. As science on this evolves, I'm betting we'll be able to have an 'up to speed' neurologist look at them in a year or so and see ME/CFS. In 2005 I even FedExed them from France to a specialist in the US to look at, but at that time the best bet was a problem with cerebral spinal fluid and the specialist said no, the MRI's did not look like that was the problem.

It is so right, they say 'normal' if they don't know what to call it, 'cause they just hate to say 'it does not look right to me, but I don't have a clue'. At least the guy in Calgary was upfront that it looked odd, but of course way back then no connection made to ME/CFS.

 

[Jemal]

We all get some weird tests results I guess.
I had a scan done and some spots in my body seemed to be damaged by arthritis. But the doctor also told me I was too young for arthritis and it didn't fully resemble arthritis damage. So we both just shrugged and moved on to the next test

 

[HowToEscape?]

True. Brain damage fortunately does not seem to be a symptom amongst CFS patients.

At the moment there's a very thin connection between XMRV and certain forms of Alzheimer's however. And XMRV and autism. So it's possible that XMRV does cause problems in the brain.

But brain scans (MRI I believe) of us folks show transient damage. I'll throw out a guess that something like an infllamation could be going on, but it doesn't (quite) kill the cells.
I know I have rapid and dramatic changes in cognitive function, from mediocre but partly functional to something like theater lights dimming, after which only a simple immediate task that has been already begun can continue. Perhaps that is coincident with some brain state, such as lack of oxygen, inflammation or non-lethal cell damage. ???

 

[Jemal]

Jemal,

Interesting ... my son's is extremely low. Is this published somewhere? Do you have a reference or link available to this information?

Hi Shannah,

This is an interesting article I think:
http://www.ergo-log.com/flushottest.html

Also low testosterone is common in men with HIV, for example:
http://aids.about.com/cs/druginformation/a/testo.htm

There's a lot more if you Google for it.

I think I have low testosterone as well, trying to get my doctor to test for it.

 

[Jemal]

But brain scans (MRI I believe) of us folks show transient damage. I'll throw out a guess that something like an infllamation could be going on, but it doesn't (quite) kill the cells.
I know I have rapid and dramatic changes in cognitive function, from mediocre but partly functional to something like theater lights dimming, after which only a simple immediate task that has been already begun can continue. Perhaps that is coincident with some brain state, such as lack of oxygen, inflammation or non-lethal cell damage. ???

Let's hope damage is not permanent as that would mean damage can be undone, once something like inflammation is taken care of. Inflammation will damage cells, but the damage will be mostly undone once the cause of the inflammation is removed. Scarring can be an issue of course.

Something like autism could also start in the womb, where the fetus doesn't develop normally because of XMRV infection in the mother. I certainly hope it's not something like that, as it's likely that kind of damage can never be healed. This theory isn't really compatible with some children suddenly getting autism.

 

[dipic]

Brain damage? Hm...

Cerebral atrophy? Certainly.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10974961

Dr.David Bell wrote a newsletter back in '05 about some studies finding cerebral atrophy in persons with ME/CFS.

[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]I do not like to deliver discouraging news. But for many years the medical world has been dismissing CFS/ME because there has been no science to say that this illness is serious. Now that scientific information is pouring in abundantly. Is the medical world going to continue to maintain that ME/CFS is a trivial psychosomatic problem of neurotics and hypochondriacs?[/FONT]
[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]
[/FONT]​

[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]In this issue of the Lyndonville News I would like to summarize several studies, two of which show the presence of cerebral atrophy. In lay terms, that means that the brain has decreased in size, presumably because of death of brain tissue. The other reviews outline a new study proving the cognitive symptoms and some older studies demonstrating decreased blood flow to the brain (cerebral hypoperfusion). In my opinion these issues are connected or linked.[/FONT]​

http://www.davidsbell.com/LynNewsV2N3.htm#Cerebral

 

[Jemal]

So our brains might be shrinking? Oh joy...

 

[George]

Look at the PVC-211 mouse model for the current science that the Rucsetti's are following as the source of the neuro part of the neuroimmune.