gms | German Medical Science

Multiple Sclerosis (MS) is an autoimmune disease. The pathogenesis is mainly caused by a dys-regulated immune system contributing to the destruction of cellularstructures within the central nervous system (CNS) and therefore leading to the impairment of different body functions. After individually having very different disease courses and duration, the disease will result in severe body and mental handicaps influencing the quality of life, even resulting in the necessity to use a wheel chair. Especially in its early phase the disease has a relapse-remission-course with periods of seeming freedom of symptoms. However the dys-regulated immune system “never sleeps” and the autoimmune pathogenesis is going on constantly: “What has been lost in the CNS cannot be reconstituted afterwards”. It is therefore of great importance to choose therapy regimens for the individual patients which might need be followed over years or life-long with compliance and adherence. To provide the respective therapeutic options, there were quite a lot of efforts realized by the pharmaceutical industry in close collaboration with academia and patient organizations.

This contribution will show examples for: research to understand pathogenesis of MS and to develop more target-oriented therapies; support of patient education to understand the disease and the necessity for continuous therapy; research on biomarkers to predict disease course or potential side effects of therapies; development of new galenics and modern devices for drug injection. Based on those developments the patient adherence to MS therapy was significantly improved, which “will pay off in the end” for all stakeholders (Patients, Physicians, Payers, Drug Developing Companies).