Each week, we identify one top search term, speculate as to what caused its popularity, and provide an infographic on a related condition. If you have thoughts about what's trending and why, feel free to share them with us on Twitter or Facebook!
Trending Clinical Topic of the Week (October 20-26): Multiple Sclerosis
The 34th Congress of the European Committee for Treatment and Research in Multiple Sclerosis (ECTRIMS) 2018 is responsible for the increased popularity in this week's top search term. As was expected, studies that were presented provided insights on everything from pathology and disease process to potential new treatments and approaches to help with related symptoms. Here's just a quick recap of some significant material shared at the conference:
Although their efficacy is "limited," new research indicates that medicinal cannabinoids are helpful for the treatment of spasticity, pain, and bladder dysfunction in patients with MS. A systematic review of 17 trials involving more than 3000 patients found a limited and mild reduction of the three symptoms.
Higher vitamin D levels were linked to better cognitive performance among patients with MS, whereas cigarette smoking was linked with worse cognition. The study also found that seropositivity for Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) infection had no significant association with cognition.
Evobrutinib, a new and novel oral drug therapy, showed promising results in its first efficacy study. The drug targets B-cell activation and was associated with substantial reductions in annualized relapse rates and number of T2 lesions.
New findings suggest a significant correlation between the time it takes to complete a manual dexterity test on an iPad and multiple patient-reported outcomes as well as MRI markers of MS. This may help save time and allow patients to take such tests while waiting in the clinic or at home.
The use of autologous stem cell transplant in MS continues to prove promising, as new research found no evidence of disease activity post-transplant in patients who previously had extremely aggressive disease. The case series is particularly interesting because these 20 patients did not previously have other disease-modifying treatments before undergoing transplantation.
A study that examined familial MS cases found that patients with familial MS had a higher annualized relapse rate than those with sporadic MS within the first 5 years of onset, a shorter time between the two first relapses, a shorter time to progression from relapsing-remitting MS to secondary progressive MS, and a shorter time to reach an Expanded Disability Status Scale (EDSS) score of 4.0.
Researchers found that a 12-week regimen of treadmill exercises was associated with improvements in cognition. This exercise was also associated with improvements in information processing speeds.
A study that examined treatment after relapse while on first-line MS therapies found that natalizumab was superior to fingolimod, especially for patients with more active disease.
Given the potential impact on patient care, it's no wonder that these studies combined to produce this week's top trending clinical topic.
For more information on MS, read here.
Medscape © 2018
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Any views expressed above are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect the views of WebMD or Medscape.
Cite this: Ryan Syrek. Trending Clinical Topics for October 2018 - Medscape - Nov 30, 2018.
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