Vaccine Might Prevent Worsening of MS

An experimental vaccine enabled some multiple sclerosis patients to build up a police squad of blood cells to stop vandalism in their nervous systems, and that kept sufferers from getting sicker, a study found.

Scientists tested the vaccine against a kind of MS that gets progressively worse over months or years. None of the six patients who built up police-like cells in the blood got worse during the yearlong study, while 10 of 17 other patients did.

The study had so few patients that it could not prove the vaccine would be useful. But experts said the vaccine’s effect was encouraging.

“It’s not a universal treatment at this point and should not be considered so until we have evidence in a lot more patients,” said the study’s author, Arthur Vandenbark of the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Portland, Ore., and the Oregon Health Sciences University.

The vaccine was tested against chronic-progressive MS, which accounts for about 15% of cases.

Nobody knows what causes the disease in which the immune system mistakenly attacks the protective sheath around nerves in the brain and spinal cord. This vandalism is caused by certain blood cells called T cells, which gang up at the sites of destruction.

People with MS have some police-like T cells that can turn off the vandalizing ones, but not enough of them, Vandenbark said.

His vaccine is aimed at getting the immune system to churn out more of these police T cells. Patients received weekly injections of the vaccine or a placebo for four weeks, then monthly for 10 months. Researchers tracked them for a year.

The vaccine mimicked a piece of a protein carried by some vandal cells. When it was injected, the police cells noticed the sharp rise in the number of these telltale protein pieces and multiplied.

Five of nine patients who received one form of the vaccine showed a rise in their levels of policing T cells. A sixth patient showed the same result from another vaccine form.

In contrast to most of the other patients, these six retained their abilities in tests of walking speed and use of hands and arms.

About 300,000 Americans have MS. Symptoms include unusual tiredness, loss of balance and muscle coordination, slurred speech, tremors and difficulty walking. In severe cases, patients are partly or completely paralyzed.