To achieve the vision of a world free of MS, the National MS Society is a driving force of MS research, relentlessly pursuing prevention, treatment and cure. We devote nearly $50 million each year to support 440 individual projects pursuing a spectrum of approaches and key initiatives. Our approach is based on the guiding principles of Speed, Collaboration and Possibilities:
Speed
Finding expeditious ways to conduct research, forge relationships, bridge barriers and garner resources to propel research forward:
- Fast-tracking high-risk pilot grants to quickly test novel ideas
- Evaluating urgent research opportunities with special peer review panels.
- Sharing resources to enhance discovery, including MS tissue banks and DNA banks.
Collaboration
Fostering coalitions worldwide with experts in other fields and diseases to make rapid and meaningful progress:
- Offering special funding for collaborative teams, including Collaborative MS Research Centers and Nervous System Repair and Protection Teams.
- Engaging thought leaders to identify new opportunities and help set priorities and to serve as peer reviewers and advisors. Our centralized peer review and funding process helps us avoid geographic and political biases, and identify the best research projects in which to strategically invest our resources. See who’s on our scientific peer review committees.
- Leveraging support from other organizations, agencies and industry to propel MS research
Possibilities
Fueling novel ideas, potential therapies, projects and technologies to discover and pursue every avenue that holds promise:
- Offering special funding to test innovative ideas
- Funding university-based research and clinical trials to feed the drug pipeline, and pursuing industry partnerships for drug development
- Exploring non-traditional research avenues, including: health care policy/delivery; quality of life; complementary/alternative therapies; and concepts initiated within the pharma/biotech industries
- Funding investigator-initiated and Society-targeted research. We invite scientists to come to us with their new ideas to be tested, and we also proactively target promising areas that are ripe for exploration.
- Right now, our researchers are developing and testing novel experimental treatments and tissue repair strategies that may soon be in use for MS. Read more about progress and intriguing leads being pursued by MS investigators.
Some Questions and Answers About Society-Funded MS Research
- Does the Society run its own labs?
No. This would duplicate facilities already available at top-notch universities. The Society instead funded investigators working on projects at their own institutions. - Where does the Society’s research money go?
Our research money supports a spectrum of grants, collaborations and training fellowships, which includes support for research personnel, supplies and equipment. We also support scientific workshops to encourage cross-fertilization of ideas and to facilitate communication of new findings in a field that, woing to the nature of MS, encompasses may different scientific disciplines. - What percentage of Society expenses supports the research mission?
According to our latest annual report, research programs accounts for 46 percent of all Home Office expenses. When expenditures of our nationwide network of chapters and the Home Office are combines, research accounts for 21 percent of all money spent by the Society. - How does the Society decide which direction we should be taking in research?
Strategic research decisions are made through a process of consensus building among advisors and specially constituted groups engaged for this purpose. Our Research Programs Advisory Committee (see Peer Review committees) is charged with ongoing review of the state of MS research and recommending areas for new focus or changed emphasis. The Society is currently engaged in consensus-building on a Roadmap to guide our research funding in coming years. - What promise do stem cells hold for people with MS?
Although no one really knows the precise answer to this question, it is clear that stem cells of all types hold unexplored potential.
A four-day Stem Cell Research Summit convened by the National MS Society and the MS International Federation January 16-19, 2007 brought together leading stem cell and MS experts from around the world to explore the potential of all types of stem cell research for the treatment, prevention and cure of MS. Read a summary of findings from the summit (.pdf).
A Few Places Where the Society is Supporting Cutting-Edge Research
- Harvard University
- Yale University
- Johns Hopkins University
- Mayo Clinic
- Cleveland Clinic Foundation
- Stanford University
- UCLA and UC San Francisco
- University of Cambridge, UK
- Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel
- Medical University of Vienna
- INSERM, Paris
- Montreal Neurological Institute
- University of British Columbia
- University of Zurich