Lupus and Other Autoimmune Diseases Several autoimmune diseases have symptoms that mimic those of MS. An autoimmune disease is one in which your immune system attacks your body's tissues and organs. One of the more common autoimmune conditions is lupus.
Numbness of the face, body, or extremities (arms and legs) is often the first symptom experienced by those eventually diagnosed as having MS.
There are different types of neuropathy such as sensory, motor, and autonomic. In some cases, neuropathy can mimic MS symptoms – including muscle weakness and balance issues – although there are ways to distinguish between the two.
People should consider the diagnosis of MS if they have one or more of these symptoms: vision loss in one or both eyes. acute paralysis in the legs or along one side of the body. acute numbness and tingling in a limb.
Neurological examination
Your neurologist will look for abnormalities, changes or weakness in your vision, eye movements, hand or leg strength, balance and co-ordination, speech and reflexes. These may show whether your nerves are damaged in a way that might suggest MS.
Hypoxic-ischemic vasculopathy, specially small-vessel disease, inflammatory disorders, vasculitis, and non-MS idiopathic inflammatory disorders, as well as some toxic, metabolic, and infectious disorders, may present mimicking MS on MR examinations and should be included in the differential diagnosis of MS-like lesions ...
If you have MS and it's early in the disease course, you might not have tested positive in all the MS tests. In fact, you might not have tested positive in any of the tests.
Vision problems are an early sign of MS. Gait and mobility changes: MS can change the way people walk due to muscle weakness and problems with balance, dizziness, and fatigue. Emotional changes and depression: Demyelination and nerve fiber damage in the brain can trigger emotional changes.
While there is no definitive blood test for MS, blood tests can rule out other conditions that cause symptoms similar to those of MS, including lupus erythematosis, Sjogren's, vitamin and mineral deficiencies, some infections, and rare hereditary diseases.
MS symptoms can come and go and change over time. They can be mild, or more severe. The symptoms of MS are caused by your immune system attacking the nerves in your brain or spinal cord by mistake.
Here's where MS (typically) starts
Although a number of MS symptoms can appear early on, two stand out as occurring more often than others: Optic neuritis, or inflammation of the optic nerve, is usually the most common, Shoemaker says. You may experience eye pain, blurred vision and headache.
MRI scans are an important way to help health care providers figure out if a person has MS or not, but MRI scans cannot diagnose MS by themselves. While it is true that almost all people with MS will have lesions on MRI, not all people with MRI lesions have MS.
Nail problems are common, and they are not usually serious. If a person has multiple sclerosis (MS), nail problems can cause pain or discomfort. While nail issues are not directly related to the disease, determining the cause may help prevent a person with MS from experiencing further discomfort.
MS is usually diagnosed between the ages of 20 and 50, but it can go undetected for years. In fact, a 2021 study suggested that many people with MS experience disease symptoms several years before being officially diagnosed with the disease.
MRI is considered the best test to help diagnose MS. However, 5% of people with MS do not have abnormalities detected on MRI; thus, a "negative" scan does not completely rule out MS. In addition, some common changes of aging may look like MS on a MRI. To track the progress of disease.
There are also multiple infectious entities that mimic MS including; progressive multi-focal leukoencephalopathy (PML), Toxoplasmosis, Tuberculosis, Herpes Simplex Virus, Cytomegalovirus, Varicella zoster virus, Epstein Barr virus, Cryptococcus and Human immunodeficiency virus.
Although MRI is a very useful diagnostic tool, a normal MRI of the brain does not rule out the possibility of MS. About 5 percent of people who are confirmed to have MS do not initially have brain lesions evidenced by MRI.
Injury, trauma and nonmedical circumstances that can cause brain lesions include: Concussions and other traumatic brain injuries. Medical procedures, such as surgery, radiation therapy or chemotherapy. Radiation exposure.
Common CSF findings in people with MS include a high level of oligoclonal bands. Oligoclonal bands indicate an increase in autoimmune activity.
Diagnosis and early intervention
As optic neuritis is the presenting sign of MS in up to 30 percent of patients, the eye exam can lead to the initial systemic diagnosis.
Early signs and symptoms of MS
tingling and numbness. pains and spasms. weakness or fatigue. balance problems or dizziness.
MS is best detected by a neurological examination and painless imaging studies of the brain and spinal cord using magnetic resonance testing (MRI). An ophthalmologist also can use a test called an optical coherence tomography (OCT) to determine if the optic nerve has been affected by MS.