Fat Hormone Tied to Multiple Sclerosis

Jan. 12, 2006 -- Blocking the hormone leptin may help prevent or slow multiple sclerosis (MS).

The report comes from Italian researchers and appears in The Journal of Clinical Investigation.

The Italian study didn't include any people. Instead, the scientists studied female mice with an MS-like disease.

Leptin is a hormone that's mostly made by fatty tissue of the body. Commonly associated with obesity, leptin plays a role in regulating weight and appetite.

Leptin also affects the immune system and has been associated with MS-like lesions in mice. That's what interested the Italian researchers, who included Giuseppe Matarese, MD, PhD.

Matarese works in Naples, Italy, at the University of Naples "Federico II" and the Institute of Experimental Endocrinology and Oncology.

Previously, Matarese and colleagues had injected leptin into mice with the MS-like disease. The mice's condition worsened.

This time, the researchers took the opposite approach. They blocked leptin in a new group of mice with the MS-like disease. For comparison, they left leptin alone in other mice with the same condition.

Over the next 40 days, the mice that had had leptin blocked fared better than mice in the comparison group. Their disease progressed more slowly.

One approach used artificial antibodies that attacked leptin. The body's immune system makes antibodies, which target viruses or other threats. Matarese's team injected mice with synthetic antibodies to neutralize leptin.

The other strategy involved a leptin "chimera." The chimera looked and acted like a leptin receptor. It latched onto leptin and held on tight.

Unlike a real leptin receptor, the chimera didn't let leptin do its usual job. Leptin was ensnared, locked down, and thwarted by the chimera. For leptin, the chimera was an alluring dead-end road that left the hormone stranded and powerless.

Blocking leptin might lead to new treatments to stall the start or worsening of the disease, at least in mice, the researchers write.

However, they aren't recommending either approach for humans just yet. They note a need for further studies to probe leptin's impact on MS.

What is Multiple Sclerosis?

Multiple Sclerosis is believed to be an autoimmune disease that affects the central nervous system and disrupts the ability of the nerves to conduct electrical impulses to and from the brain.
Thirty people in Bermuda are known to have been diagnosed with MS, but it is thought the number of people with the condition could be three times higher.
There is no cure for the disease, but there are treatments that can reduce its effects.

These are some of the common symptoms of Multiple Sclerosis:
l Fatigue, weakness, spasticity, balance problems, bladder and bowel problems, numbness, vision loss, tremors and depression.
l

Not all symptoms affect all MS patients. No two persons necessarily have the same complaints and no one develops all of the symptoms.
l Symptoms may be persistent or may cease from time to time. Most patients have episodic patterns of attacks and remissions throughout the disease course.
Symptoms may remit completely, leaving no residual damage, or partially leaving degrees of permanent impairment. Because the symptoms that define the clinical picture of MS are the result of nerve lesions causing disturbances in electrical conduction in one or more areas of the central nervous system (CNS), the nature of the symptoms that occur is determined by the location of the lesion.
For example, an optic nerve lesion may cause blurred vision; a brain stem lesion may cause dizziness or double vision; a spinal cord lesion may cause coordination or balance problems.
For more information visit http://www.msfacts.org/info/info_symptoms.html

We are going to beat MS.

To All: My wife was diagnosed almost two years ago. I am thankful now for every day she is with me.

Just enjoying life as much as you can is the way to beat this insidious disease. Make sure you have a good neurologist. Attend conferences and communicate with others. Many approaches to a cure and and better treatments are being researched all over the world. PS, thanks Magnolia, we are doing better now.

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By Miranda Hitti WebMD Medical News	Reviewed By Louise Chang, MD on Thursday, January 12, 2006

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