ANU study investigates new ways to treat multiple sclerosis, backed … – The Canberra Times

Anne Hill says she would give anything not to start each day in agony.

The 56-year-old multiple sclerosis suffer was grateful to have experienced her first overseas holiday 12 months ago - a surprise gift from her children - before her health rapidly deteriorated.

A strong advocate for MS research, Ms Hill welcomed new ANU research searching for cheaper and more effective ways to treat the chronic, inflammatory disease.

Sydney-based MS Research Australia has given the ANU a $200,000 grant to help improve many of the 23,000 Australian lives affected by MS.

The study will focus on how new drugs could prevent a process in the body called neutrophil extracellular traps, or NETs, from inflaming neourons.

NETs are formed when immune system cells, called 'neutrophil', make contact with bacteria, activated platelets and inflammatory stimuli.

This process helps the body defend against infection, but can also mistakenly kill the body's own cells, leading to a variety of diseases.

Dr Anne Bruestle from The John Curtin School of Medical Research and lead researcher said the study will look at how NETs interact with cells to determine how new treatment could stop inflammation.

"The role of both neutrophils and their NETs is so far not clearly understood in the context of MS and its laboratory models," Dr Bruestle said.

"The results we've seen are promising because the treatment is already known to have minimal side effects and is inexpensive to manufacture."

If successful, the study will be groundbreaking for the treatment of MS, a condition with no known cure that affects the central nervous system and the brain's ability to control the body.

Multiple Sclerosis costs Australia more than $1 billion a year, according to the ANU.

Dr Bruestle said the project's findings would be used to test MS patients for their level of neutrophils and NETs and examine what role they play in the disease.

"The results of this study will underpin any future clinical trials of a treatment for MS based on NETs," she said.

Ms Hill, who lost her family business and home to her primary progressive MS she was diagnosed with 11 years ago, said new treatment options were desperately needed for the debilitating disease.

She is on the common treatment copaxene, which she says is one of the better treatments in terms of side effects, though she still suffers from daily pain.

"Any treatment with little to no side effects will help so many people, because most of us [MS sufferers] look fine, but there are process and side effects going on inside that arecausing us pain," Ms Hill said.

"Like for me, when people kneel on their foot and have pins and needles, that's how my legs feel all the time."

"You just suck it up and get on with it. But I hope more research continues to lead to better treatment and one day a cure."

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ANU study investigates new ways to treat multiple sclerosis, backed ... - The Canberra Times