Nuero Matters....

On Friday, I returned to the Walton Centre in Liverpool for a follow up following on from the consultation I received 2 months ago.

As it was, I did not see the same person that I saw previously and I felt a little let down about that, rather I saw a young Indian woman and explained my medical history to her once again (note to self - must make a standard short form history document tracking my illness) and she basically offered me little that I did not already know.

Let me take a moment to explain to you exactly what my situation is.

Basically, I have all the symptoms and medical related evidence consistent with MS, however, I dont conform to McDonalds Criteria which is the criteria used to give someone a diagnosis. As I have explained previously, MS is rarely something that is diagnosed on symptoms alone, rather it is a clinical diagnosis given over a period of time based on recurrence of symptoms.

So what is McDonalds Criteria I hear you ask. Well, in my case, to be diagnosed, I would have to have a number of "attacks" in a certain time frame. McDonalds Criteria sets out the definitions of what an "attack" is classed as and also the length of time between these attacks to set out a diagnosis.

There you have it, I have "attacks" but I dont have them closely enough to each other time wise to be given a diagnosis.

The funny thing is that what I do have, does not appear to be anything that has a name. You either have MS or you are well!!! It seems weird.

Obviously there is the chance that things may never change for me. Its possibly the best outcome as while a diagnosis would give me access to lots of support, medication and car parking badges, it is better to not to have a disease than have one. I am sure you understand.

Oh and before I left, just to spoil my day, they took 10 viles of blood to test for lots of other stuff!!!

I go back again in 4 months. I will keep you posted!!!