Funding:

Brain Health Alliance for monetary and management support;
Avid Radiopharmaceuticals for material support providing use of the Amyvid radiopharmaceutical;
collaborating medical imaging site at UC San Diego Imaging & Radiology for equipment and personnel support providing use of PET scanners.

Description

Can an entire-body positron emission tomography (PET) scanner be used to improve evaluation, monitoring and measurement of both peripheral and central damage to nerve-insulating myelin (demyelination) in people with MS? We assume here that demyelination outside the brain may involve the spinal cord if not also possibly some of the larger peripheral nerves outside the spinal column in a manner that may be detected with the greater sensitivity and resolution of the most recent state-of-the-art PET scanners. Improved molecular imaging with new entire-body PET scanners that provide improved detection sensitivity and spatial resolution for quantitative  measurement of demyelination and remyelination will support better decision-making for patient care with more robust outcome measures for monitoring therapeutic drugs evaluated in clinical trials for the treatment of multiple sclerosis.

MS patients will be counseled for informed consent and screened for both the inclusion and exclusion criteria of the study. Those patients who agree to join the EPSMS Study will participate in online visits for televideo counseling sessions both before and after the PET scan. This medical imaging scan requires an onsite visit to UC San Diego Imaging & Radiology in La Jolla California. Prior to the PET scan, participants will be asked to provide urine and blood samples. The PET scan itself requires injection of the Amyvid imaging agent. Additional information detailing risks and benefits of the study may be found in the clinical trial protocol report available at https://www.brainiacsjournal.org/arc/pub/Taswell2020EPSMS 

Please visit https://epsms.brainhealthalliance.net/ for further details.