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MS Hits African Americans Harder

(February 8, 2010) - Fewer African Americans than Caucasians develop multiple sclerosis (MS), statistics show, but their disease progresses more rapidly, and they don't respond as well to therapies, a new study has found. (Read about "Multiple Sclerosis")

Magnetic resonance images (MRI) of 567 consecutive MS patients showed that blacks with MS had more damage to brain tissue and had less normal white and gray matter compared to whites with the disease. (Read about "MRI - Magnetic Resonance Imaging" "The Brain")

Results of the study appear in the journal Neurology.

"Black patients showed more brain tissue damage and accumulated brain lesions faster than whites, along with rapid clinical deterioration," confirms Bianca Weinstock-Guttman, MD, first author on the study. "The results provide further support that black patients experience a more severe disease, calling for individualized therapeutic interventions for this group of MS patients."

"White matter" refers to the parts of the brain that contain nerve fibers sheathed in a white fatty insulating protein called myelin. The white matter is responsible for communication between the various gray matter regions, where nerve cells are concentrated and where cognitive processing occurs.

"Initially, multiple sclerosis was considered primary a white-matter disease," says Weinstock-Guttman, "but today we know that the gray matter may be more affected than white matter."

In general, black MS patients tend to have more severe and more frequent attacks, followed by an incomplete recovery even after the first episode. Studies on signs and symptoms of MS among populations have shown that blacks experience gait problems sooner after their diagnosis, show faster cognitive decline than whites with MS, and become dependent on a wheelchair sooner, she notes.

Seventy-nine black patients and 488 white patients were entered in the study. Participants were older than 18 and had been scanned within 90 days of their most recent clinical visit. Black participants were significantly younger, and their disease was more severe than white patients, despite having MS for a shorter amount of time.